


Blood and Anger and Revenge

by Goldy, thirty2flavors



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Angst, Drama, F/M, no seriously angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-09-12
Updated: 2014-07-29
Packaged: 2018-02-10 21:10:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 30,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2040285
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Goldy/pseuds/Goldy, https://archiveofourown.org/users/thirty2flavors/pseuds/thirty2flavors
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Years after settling in on Pete's World, the Doctor must face something he thought he could escape.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was the start of a beautiful collaboration relationship.

  
His trainers slapped against the ground and a bead of sweat trickled down his back.

He saw a group of people crowded up ahead, the Thames winding behind them, and he sped up, pushing them out of his way. Police sirens wailed behind him and camera lights flashed in his face. He was dimly aware of a low murmur of voices that whispered “Tyler” and “that’s him.”

The crowd thinned, parting in front of him. He stumbled to a stop, tight pain winding through his chest and down to his stomach. His instincts told him to run, to just _leave_ , go _right now_ , but he was drawn forward.

He got his first glimpse of the body, wrapped in towels and plastic sheets. Blonde hair—the body had blonde hair.

****

Rose had been unusually cheerful that morning.

“Britain is going to be the first country in the world to sign a free trade agreement with another planet,” she declared, adjusting her suit. “It’s going to be a right bit of diplomacy. Lots of flag waving and canapés and the like. Dad even booked a band.”

“I love canapés,” said the Doctor. He held out a plate of toast and Rose picked up the top piece. “Just... one question. Why on earth would anyone sign a free trade agreement with England?”

“They love our fish and chips,” she said with a shrug. “They’re gonna keep their heart specialists employed for years.”

The Doctor snickered and Rose took a bite of toast. He watched with amusement as she dribbled crumbs down the front of her new suit.

“Tell me again why I can’t go?” he said.

“‘Diplomacy’ is sort of the key word here.”

She grinned at him and he couldn’t stop himself from grinning back. “And if there’s trouble?”

“I imagine I’ll panic, scream, and generally be completely helpless without you.”

“All right,” he said. “You can handle yourself.”

“Yup,” Rose said. She quirked an eyebrow and swallowed the rest of her toast. “D’you like my new suit?”

She spun around in a circle, helpfully demonstrating how a well-cut jacket and pencil skirt showed off all her curves.

“It’s... nice, yeah,” he said, eyes still lingering on her form. “Suits you.”

“Oi,” Rose said. She flicked a finger at his chest. “We both know what happens when you look at me like that. I’ve got an important meeting to attend.”

“Oh, do you have to?”

“Free trade agreement. Fish and chips.”

“Right, that.” He set the plate of toast back down on the table and then leaned in to give her a lingering kiss. “Good luck.”

She smiled. “I’ll see you later.”

It was the last time he saw her alive.

 

****

 

“We lost communication at fourteen hundred hours,” Pete Tyler said in a hollow voice. “The rest of the team is missing and unaccounted for.”

Next to him, Jackie sat slumped over the small briefing table, her face ashen and grey. Pete rested one hand on her shoulder and squeezed.

The Doctor stood off to the side from them, half hidden in the office’s shadows. The air conditioning was on at full blast, but he was sweating, his heart pounding furiously in his chest.

A young man in a military uniform saluted Pete from the other side of the table. “We’re scouring the Thames now, sir.”

The Doctor’s gaze swept over the lad. Torchwood’s head of security, if he hasn’t mistaken. “Sorry, Charles is it?” He waited for Charles’s terse nod before continuing. “You won’t find any more bodies. Rose was head of the mission. She was a symbol. They put her where we would find her.”

“We don’t know that—” Pete began.

“I’ve seen this tactic before,” said the Doctor. “Why go for the legs when you can cut off the head? Rose’s face is the one splashed across the papers—the Vitex _heiress_ ,” he spat. “And it got her killed.”

Jackie choked on an audible sob while the colour drained from Pete’s face.

“We don’t know that,” he repeated, voice shaking. “We don’t even know who killed her.”

“Oh, I think we do,” said the Doctor. He curled his hands into fists. “She thought they were after fish and chips. She had no idea...”

Pete and Head of Security Charles exchanged a look.

“Doctor,” began Pete slowly, “that free trade agreement was important to Rose. She knew how badly we needed it. Britain’s made huge gains since the Cybermen, but we’re still behind the rest of Europe. We can’t risk losing this chance. Not without more evidence.”

“Pete Tyler,” the Doctor murmured. “Look at you—standing up for Queen and country.”

“We actually haven’t, um, got a Queen in this world, sir,” said Charles. The Doctor shot him a dark look and he shrank back. “Sorry.”

He focused his attention back on Pete. “Your daughter is _dead_. And here you are, defending the aliens that killed her.” He paused. “Of course, she wasn’t your real daughter, was she? Maybe if it had been Tony—maybe then you wouldn’t be so quick to defend them for the sake of the economy.”

Pete rose to his feet. “That’s enough. Torchwood isn’t in the habit of enacting vengeance on the first aliens we come across.”

“Then you’ll lose,” said the Doctor. His heart was pounding again and there was a sharp ringing in his ears. “I told you—killing Rose sent us a message. We’ve got to send one back.”

“You’re upset,” said Pete. “I understand that. It might be best for everyone if you... took some time.”

“I’m not asking your permission,” said the Doctor. “I don’t have to live by your rules, Pete Tyler. I’m a Time Lord.”

“You haven’t been a Time Lord for a long time,” Pete murmured. “I’m sorry, Doctor, but Torchwood is in charge of this mission and we’re not acting without more proof.”

The Doctor stared at him in stony silence, ears still ringing. Finally he said, “There’s nothing you can do to stop me.”

Pete flinched. “Right now, you’re not thinking straight, you—”

“No, he’s making perfect sense,” Jackie interrupted. She also rose her to her feet. She glanced in Pete’s direction and then made her way over to the Doctor’s side, folding her arms across her chest.

The fight seemed to go out of Pete. “Jackie—”

“She was my _daughter_ ,” said Jackie, voice rising shrilly. “My real daughter and you and your Torchwood got her killed.”

Pete sat back down. “Jacks, I’m sorry.”

The Doctor rested his hand on Jackie’s shoulder, feeling an unexpected connection to the only other person in the world who had some inkling of what it was like to lose Rose. Without another word, Jackie turned and buried her face in his chest, shoulders shaking with sobs.

The Doctor held her quietly, gazed fixed on Pete.

“Alright,” Pete said. He buried his face in his hands. “Do what you want.”

****

There are ways to kill that are virtually instantaneous, methods as close to painless as possible.

The Doctor chose none of those.

From an empty field nearby he stood and watched the building burn. There was a roar and crackle as the flames engulfed the skeleton of the building; with a loud crack, the ceiling caved in. Even at his distance he could feel the heat rolling off the wreckage in waves, permeating his suit and making his skin damp with sweat. The thick billows of ash and smoke stung his eyes and hurt his nose, but the Doctor barely felt it.

It had taken eight hours to organize and execute what was to be considered Torchwood’s retaliation. It had been sixteen hours since a body was pulled out of the Thames, nineteen hours since Torchwood had lost communications with its team, and twenty-two hours and six minutes since the Doctor had kissed Rose Tyler over toast.

With a lingering groan of metal and wood, the second storey fell in, shooting a flurry of sparks into the sky.

Twenty-two hours, seven minutes.

The Doctor closed his eyes and tilted his chin upward, soaking in the warmth of the blaze.

“You don’t think they’ll come back?” came a voice, and the Doctor opened his eyes to find Jake Simmonds standing next to him, holding an umbrella. It was only then that the Doctor noticed it was raining and that he was in fact soaking wet.

“Doubt it,” he said shortly, watching with a distant interest as a drop of rain rolled from the shoulder of his jacket down his sleeve. “No survivors.” He shrugged, looking back to the fire. “If they do come back, I’ll deal with them.”

From the corner of his eye, he saw Jake shift. “Yeah,” said Jake quietly. Then he nodded towards the road. “Car’s waiting. We’d better go.”

With the simplest of nods and one last look at the fire, the Doctor turned and led the way back to the waiting Torchwood van.

Twenty-two hours, nine minutes.

****

They gave him back her wedding ring, explaining that the alternative was to bury it with her. When he finally opened his hand an hour later to place it on a chain, he realized he’d been holding the ring tight enough to draw blood.

****

He spent the entire funeral staring at the floor and listening to Jackie Tyler cry.

He very nearly hadn’t come at all. Back when he’d had the TARDIS he had keenly avoided funerals, no matter whose they were; funerals were the aftermath, part of the clean-up, and clean-up was something he just didn’t do. Breaking that habit with Rose Tyler’s funeral seemed like jumping straight into the deep end, and the Doctor was certain he was going to drown.

But as the widower he supposed he didn’t have much choice, and in any case Rose deserved better than cowardice. So he sat in a pew, fingers aching as he gripped the edge of his wooden seat, and stared at the floor to avoid looking at the casket.

There were songs and eulogies and the sort of religious babble the Doctor found fascinating and naive, but none of it drowned out the sound of Jackie, sobbing unabashedly for the entire service. From his seat at the opposite end of the pew the Doctor listened to her intently, as though his entire being was drawn to the sounds of her heartbreak by some masochistic string. Even when he spoke – empty, inadequate words – he watched her, morbidly fascinated by the way she wore her grief on her sleeve. He kept his own grief jealously guarded, a tight ball in his chest that weighed down his heart and made it difficult to breathe. It was a dead weight somewhere under his ribcage, a burden he couldn’t imagine he’d ever be rid of. It would stay there, nestled alongside the guilt from the Time War, for as long as his single human heart could sustain him. How long would that be, he wondered? Forty years? Forty-five? Fifty?

He gripped the bench harder, his fingernails digging into the wood, his eyes slipping shut. More than anything he wanted to run, to leave the planet and never look back. He longed for the escape, however infinitesimal, that the TARDIS would have offered him.

As it was, he was stuck. _Stuck with you_ , Rose had said once, _that’s not so bad_. But stuck without her…

The Doctor could think of nothing worse.

 

****

 

“I wish Mum would stop crying,” Tony muttered, tugging impatiently at his tie. “It’s weird.”

He and the Doctor were seated on the back balcony of the Tyler mansion, cross-legged on the wooden floor and out of sight. Somewhere on the first floor there were guests eating hors d’oeuvres and offering their condolences to Jackie and Pete, pretending they had any idea how it felt to be without Rose. Tony had been unhappy with the crowd, and the Doctor was all too happy to escape the never-ending flood of _I’m so sorry_ s. Many of the guests he’d never seen before, and many he suspected he would never see again. Many, he was sure, just wanted to witness the Vitex heiress’ memorial service.

The thought made him sick.

“She loved your sister very much,” said the Doctor quietly, reaching over to undo Tony’s tie for him. “She’s probably going to be sad for some time. She’ll need you to be around for her. It’s very hard to lose a child.”

Tony nodded mutely, staring at the plate of food in his lap, swirling one baby carrot around and around in ranch dressing. “You haven’t been crying,” he said, “and you’re married to her.”

The Doctor laughed, low and bitter. “I wouldn’t consider myself a benchmark for healthy coping mechanisms.”

Tony looked at him, uncomprehending, and then looked back at his food.

Years from now, the Doctor knew, Tony would barely be able to recall his older sister – the sound of her voice or the way she spoke or the particular way she bit her tongue when she smiled. By the time Tony was grown, Rose would be a distant memory, a fairy tale more than a sister. He'd forget the details, and his heart wouldn't try to leap out of his chest every time he saw the right shade of bottle blonde.

The Doctor envied Tony as much as he pitied him.

“Mum and Dad were talking about you last night,” Tony said, tracing ranch dressing shapes on his paper plate. “They’re worried. Mum says you’re too quiet, and you’re keepin’ it all to yourself and it’s gonna make you crazy.”

The Doctor snorted softly, shaking his head and looking up at the dark night sky. Jackie Tyler, worried about his mental health. How bizarre. “You don’t have to worry about me, Tony. I’ll be all right. I’m always all right.” The familiar lie came out all too easily.

Tony fell silent at that, and bent his head. He lifted the plate from his lap and set it down beside him, hugging his knees to his chest and following the Doctor’s skyward gaze. A long silence stretched between them, and then Tony said, very quietly, “I miss Rose.”

“Yeah,” said the Doctor, his throat suddenly thick. “Me too.” He dropped his eyes from the sky to where his hands lay, folded together in his lap. “Every second.”

 

****

 

That night was the first time he returned to the flat he’d shared with Rose.

“Oh, sweetheart, stay with us,” Jackie had offered, her voice soft and sympathetic, her hand on his arm. But he felt claustrophobic in the Tyler mansion, surrounded by Jackie and Pete and Tony and the hired help, and he couldn’t avoid the flat forever.

Beyond that, he was nine hundred years old. He’d killed his own species and destroyed his own planet. He did not need Jackie or Pete to babysit him and teach him how to grieve; he’d been doing it for years.

Still, the second he slipped his key into the lock, his heart rate seemed to double. The instant he stepped through the door, a wave of fresh loss nearly winded him.

He had finally reached the point where the flat really, truly felt like home. Now, without Rose’s constant presence, the walls seemed zapped of their warmth, leaving only a tiny collection of carpets and doors. A surge of nausea hit, and he leaned heavily against the front door, wrestling with the urge to run. There was nowhere to go, anyway, nowhere in the entire world that held a single shred of interest for him. He had no desire to travel, no desire to bury himself in a foreign culture. He knew it wouldn’t help.

He wanted the TARDIS. More than a quick route from point A to point B, the TARDIS had offered companionship and constancy when the rest of the universe turned its back on him. He’d been willing to lose that sanctuary in exchange for a life with Rose, and it was a choice he’d make again and again and again.

But now he had neither, and the Doctor didn’t think he’d ever felt more alone.

A spark of white-hot anger shot down his spine, churning his stomach and warming him to the tips of his fingers. Somewhere on the other side of the Void was the TARDIS, and with her was the other Doctor, one whose last memory of Rose was not the way she looked, cold and lifeless on a gurney – one who still had all of time and space at his fingertips – one whose name still functioned as a threat – one whose life still had meaning and purpose, however much he might try to deny it.

The part-human Doctor had never before resented his doppelganger for leaving him and Rose on that beach in Norway. He’d been grateful, more than anything, that he had never had to fight a competition he knew he’d have lost. Now he felt a fresh, fiery hatred for the man with his face and his name and both of his hearts.

It was meant to be a trade-off, he thought. The universe or a life with Rose – sacrifice one to keep the other. The Doctor was not naïve enough to think of the universe as kind, but to take both from him in such short order was downright vindictive.

He dug the heels of his hands into his eyes and took three steadying breaths to keep his composure, then shoved himself away from the door and strode into the flat.

 

****

 

Their bedroom was the worst.

He stood in the doorway for a long moment before he entered, his gaze traveling from her shoes (just outside her closet) to her shirt (draped haphazardly over the armchair) to her perfume (half-empty in its bottle on the dresser). On the nightstand he saw a single gold earring, one whose mate she’d lost at a Vitex function not three weeks ago and never found.

He felt cold from head to toe and swayed on his feet, gripping the doorframe with one hand to steady himself.

He couldn’t do this, he thought suddenly and resolutely. He couldn’t possibly live out the next four or five decades in a tiny, cramped flat on a tiny, cramped planet, eating chips and watching telly and living the stupid, mundane life humans satisfied themselves with. He couldn’t go on without Rose. He _wouldn’t_.

Feeling faint, he closed his eyes. When he opened them again his vision was blurred.

He stumbled towards the bed and shed his suit jacket and tie at the same time, dropping them unceremoniously onto the floor. He crawled under the duvet and lay on her side of the bed, breathing deep into her pillow, trying desperately to capture one last lingering trace of her indefinable scent.

Then the Doctor closed his eyes and allowed himself to cry for the first time. He sobbed so hard his lungs ached, until at last exhaustion won out and he fell into a restless sleep.  


\--


	2. Chapter 2

He wasn’t surprised when Jackie came calling the next morning.  
  
He was in the kitchen when the knock came, frying up a pan of bacon and eggs. He flipped the eggs, turned off the stove, and then dodged a pile of doodads and wires in the front hall.  
  
“Jackie,” he said, smiling as he opened the door. “Nice to see you.”  
  
She most definitely did not smile back. Instead, her eyes crinkled and then softened, and she reached up, stroking her hand along his cheek. “Oh good, you’re all right. We’ve been worrying about you, sweetheart. After yesterday, well—I thought you might try and off yourself or something. I was up half the night. Pete said I was talking crazy, but I had to come by and see for myself. How are you, though, really?”  
  
“I’m all right, Jackie.” said the Doctor, leaning backwards. He really wished Jackie would stop touching his cheek.  
  
Apparently taking his answer to mean “come in and make yourself at home,” Jackie stepped into the flat and closed the door behind her. “Look at this place—it’s a right mess in here.” She blinked at the jumble of cables in the front hall, blocking the path to the kitchen. “What is that?”  
  
“Oh, just… bits of Rose’s dimension cannon,” he said, waving an arm vaguely. Something in the kitchen dinged and the Doctor perked up. “Breakfast!”  
  
Without waiting for a response, he jumped over the cables and dashed back into the kitchen. He stuck his head out of the door to talk to Jackie. “Eggs and bacon? There’s plenty.”  
  
“You made breakfast?” Jackie said.  
  
“Yup!” He sniffed the air. “Ah. Looks like it’s going to be a lovely day. Do you know, I don’t think we’ve had a full day of sunshine in months. That’s London for you, I suppose.”  
  
He ladled some bacon, eggs, and toast on a plate and then turned around, prepared to offer it to Jackie, when a hand smacked against his cheek.  
  
“Ow! Blimey!” he yelped, hurriedly setting the plate back on the counter. He cradled his cheek protectively, glaring at Jackie. How did she get into the kitchen so quickly? “What did you do that for?!”  
  
“You—you’re making breakfast,” she said, between deep breaths of air. She suddenly looked far from the image of motherly concern that had greeted him at the front door. “And talking about the weather! Like it didn’t matter… like Rose isn’t even  _gone_. How  _could_  you?”  
  
She looked like she might hit him again, but then she broke down, crying into her hands. The Doctor hesitated a moment and then approached her, resting his hands on her shoulders.  
  
“No, Jackie, no—it’s not that. Don’t think that. Not even for a moment.”  
  
“Then  _why_?” Jackie sobbed, lowering her arms back to her sides.  
  
“Jackie, listen,” he said, meeting her gaze. “I know how to bring Rose back.”  
  
Jackie’s mouth fell open, mute for one, blessed moment. “ _How_?” she finally wailed. “They pulled her body out of the Thames—you were there!”  
  
“It’s not going to be easy,” he said, voice rising. He steered her over to the table, pushing her non-too-gently into the chair. “But I’ve got a plan.”  
  
He returned to countertop and picked up their breakfast plates—likely cold by now, he thought, with an irritable frown—and then sat down at the table. He nudged a plate in Jackie’s direction, raising his eyebrows.  
  
Jackie eyed the food and then grabbed a fork, digging in. He followed suit, stomach rumbling. He was suddenly starving. Neither of them had been eating much since… since…  
  
 _Rose disappeared_ , he thought firmly. It was better that way. Death was too final… too unchangeable.  
  
“So out with it, then,” Jackie finally said, still working her way through the eggs. “You can bring her back? Rose?”  
  
“Oh, yes,” he said, around a mouthful of toast. He chewed and swallowed. “I’ve had a go at her old dimension cannon—a few tugs there, a complete overwrite of its main drive, and presto! I’ll be able to travel to the nearest alternate universe any time I want—not just when Davros is trying to destroy all of reality.” He paused and nibbled on a piece of bacon. “From there, I track my other self down, convince him to lend me the TARDIS—and then I come back here, go back in time and rescue Rose.” He smiled winningly at Jackie. “No problemo. At least, not for a Time Lord.”  
  
Instead of looking ecstatic, the colour drained from Jackie’s face. She pushed her half-eaten plate away from her, hand going to her stomach like she might be sick. “You can’t do that.”  
  
His smile didn’t falter. “What? Of course I can. I used to do it all the time.”  
  
“But Rose always said—she said when she made that thing that she couldn’t go mucking about in time. She said that saying the wrong thing at the wrong time could destroy everything.”  
  
“Jackie, I think I know a thing or two about time travel.”  
  
"Oh, don't give me that," Jackie said, waving a fork in his direction. "I'm not completely stupid. You can't go changing life and death, Doctor. Everyone knows that."  
  
He heard a faint buzzing in his ears and an empty feeling pressed against his chest. He thought about the forty or fifty years stretching out in front of him without Rose. He felt a burning feeling in his eyes and he pushed it back. He had a plan. He would rescue Rose. He would get Rose back. He just had to focus on that.  
  
“I’ve got to try.”  
  
Jackie’s eyes flashed and she stood up, hands going to her hips. “Rose told me about Pete, you know. Not this Pete, but the Pete back home—my Pete. She told me about what happened when she tried to save him.”  
  
He looked away. “Jackie, don’t—”  
  
“Is that what will happen here? If you save Rose, will you destroy the rest of us?”  
  
He pressed his fists to his eyes and said, “I don’t know, Jackie. I just… I don’t know.” He dropped his hands back down onto his lap. “Time Lords can feel timelines, Jackie. I’ll know whether or not I can bring her back. I’ll see all the possible outcomes.”  
  
“And if you’re  _wrong_?” Jackie said. “What happens then, Doctor? Tell me.”  
  
“Then… I’ll destroy everything.”  
  
Jackie sat back down, suddenly looking pale and worn out. He looked away, blurred vision resting on the spare parts of the dimension cannon. He slowly felt the last bit of his hope drain away.  
  
“And the other you,” Jackie whispered, “what about him? Would he just hand over the TARDIS?”  
  
He waited a moment before answering. “No. I imagine not.”  
  
“So you're planning on stealing it from him? Oh, that’ll work.”  
  
“Stop it,” he said, turning back to the table. He rubbed his eyes, trying to hold back his tears. “Just… stop it.”  
  
“I’m not stopping anything,” Jackie said, getting worked up again. “I’ll not have you going around and blowing up the same universe Rose worked so hard to protect.”  
  
His shoulders slumped and he felt like he was collapsing. He was completely helpless and he hated it.  
  
“I can’t do this without her,” he whispered.  
  
“Oh, sweetheart,” Jackie murmured. “I know you feel that way now, but…” she trailed off. “You can’t use that thing. A part of you knew that all along, didn’t it?”  
  
He forced himself to nod even though he resented her treating him like a child, like all he needed was a pat on the head and a biscuit.   
  
“Well,” she said, pulling herself together. “No reason why we should tell Pete about this then, eh?”  
  
He stared blankly in front of him, a gnawing panicky feeling rising in his chest. “I’d like to be alone,” he said abruptly, standing up.  
  
Jackie hesitated. “You could come back to the mansion, Doctor. I’m not sure it’s such a good idea for you to be on your own.”  
  
“I need to be alone,” he repeated. “Please, Jackie.”  
  
She studied him for a few seconds and then nodded. “Thank you for the breakfast,” she said. “Why don’t I see myself out?”  
  
She looked like she might hug him and he hastily backed out of the way. Jackie sighed and then moved around him, stepping gingerly over the dimension cannon wreckage before disappearing down the hall. He heard the door close a moment later.  
  
He sighed in relief, bracing his weight against the wall with one hand. The panicked, empty feeling clogged at his throat and he turned away, stumbling back towards the bedroom. He sat down heavily on the bed, blinking around the familiar room like he’d never seen it before.  
  
The dimension cannon had given him something to do. It had been a  _purpose_  and a reason to keep going. Now he had nothing.  
  
****  
  
For the next week he kept mainly to the flat. His sole venture into the public for groceries brought him face-to-face with a tabloid reporter eager for a statement. After that reporter’s camera met a rather sticky end, the Doctor thought it might be best for everyone if he stayed home. He slept little and ate less, answered just enough phone calls to keep Jackie at bay, and spent most of his time curled up on the bed or the sofa, lost in thought.  
  
He wondered how things were on the other side of the Void – how long the other Doctor had kept to his inevitable resolution to travel alone, if Martha Jones was now Martha Milligan, how Donna was doing after having the very best parts of her life stripped away. Then he thought about Jackie, feeling for the second time the horrible sting of losing a child.  
  
He tried to think of ways he could spend the next few decades that would make them bearable. He'd told Martha once that there was always something to live for, but laying on his back, staring at the ceiling of an empty flat, he found it difficult to imagine what that something might be.  
  
Mostly he thought about Rose.  
  
He kept her things exactly where she’d left them. The mug on the coffee table, the necklace on the dresser, the sock just barely peeking out from underneath the bed, the post-it on the fridge reminding them to buy more milk – all of them he left untouched. He existed around them, went out of his way to leave them undisturbed. He liked it, at first, the way these things made it feel like he wasn’t living alone. For a few naïve days, he lived in a daze, half-convinced that if he pretended long enough he might be able to will her back to life.  
  
By the end of the week he ran out of that brand of deluded optimism, so he found two large boxes to fill with Rose’s things.  
  
Back when he’d lost Rose the first time, on the TARDIS, getting rid of her things had consisted of sweeping them all into her room and vowing never to step foot in there again. At the time, it had seemed incredible to him that Rose could have so many belongings all over the TARDIS, particularly when, in theory, she had still been living at home. Finding and rounding up every little telltale scrap of Rose had seemed like an impossible task.  
  
It was even more difficult this time around.  
  
He started with her clothes. He stared at them for a long moment, neat and tidy on their hangers, before he worked up the nerve to reach out and pull something down. It was a simple shirt, red and soft cotton, and it was one he’d always admired for the way it hugged her. She’d worn it the first time she’d taken him to the little Indian place down the block, and she’d been wearing it the day they sort of accidentally stumbled into an engagement. He stroked his thumb over the fabric and noticed how cold it felt without the warmth of her body beneath it. He blinked at it, feeling a strange and jarring sense of disassociation.  
  
And then, quite suddenly, he was angry, furious at the universe and everything in it. He threw Rose’s shirt into a box and ripped the rest of her hangers from the shelf, tossing them in the box as well. He combed through the rest of the flat like that in under an hour, grabbing things and shoving them out of sight, seething the entire time.  
  
He was furious with Torchwood for getting her killed. He was furious with the aliens that killed her. He was furious with Rose for leaving him behind. He was furious with himself for not seeing this coming. He should never have left the TARDIS. He should have known the universe wouldn’t let him be so happy for long.  
  
It wasn’t worth it, he thought, sealing up the boxes of her things with shaking hands. The brief glimpses of happiness the universe sometimes afforded him – they weren’t worth it. They made everything else hurt so much more.  
  
He stored the boxes in the closet in the spare room, taped up and tucked neatly out of sight. The flat looked barren with everything gone, but the Doctor found he liked it. It wasn't a home, not without Rose, and there was no need for it to look like one. Satisfied but emotionally drained, the Doctor stood in the shower with his back against the wall, running the hot water until it turned cold.  
  
Only two overt traces of Rose did he leave in place, sitting beneath the lamp on the nightstand. The first was a photo he’d taken of her at their wedding reception, grinning at the camera with her tongue between her teeth; the second was her wedding ring, hanging on its chain from the corner of the photo frame.  
  
****  
  
The next day, the Doctor went to Torchwood’s London headquarters.  
  
“Pete Tyler,” said the Doctor, leaning against the doorway to the man’s office. “Hard at work as always.”  
  
Pete looked up from his desk, surprised but evidently none too pleased. “Doctor,” said Pete, nodding in greeting. “Haven’t seen you in a few days. Jacks said you wouldn’t answer the phone yesterday, she was getting worried. How are you?”  
  
The Doctor ignored the question, striding into the room with his hands in his pockets. “I’ve got a favour to ask you, Pete Tyler.” He came to a stop just in front of Pete’s desk. From his angle, he could just make out the picture of the four Tylers that stood on the desk, next to the mug of pencils. The Doctor swallowed hard and turned his eyes to Pete.  
  
Pete, too, was quiet a moment, staring at the photograph on his desk. Then he shook himself and looked at the Doctor. “Oh? What’s that?”  
  
“I want a job,” said the Doctor.  
  
Pete stared at him, surprised, and then finally nodded. “Right. A job, right.” He sat forward in his chair, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Have you got a field in mind? We’ll need to get you a CV, some references…”  
  
The Doctor raised one eyebrow. “I wasn’t under the impression Torchwood would need to see my CV.”  
  
Pete stopped ticking off things on his fingers and stared at the Doctor again, dumbfounded. The Doctor suspected that he’d have found the expression quite humourous, if he were in a better mood.  
  
“You want to work for Torchwood,” said Pete slowly, as though he could barely comprehend the idea.  
  
“Yep.”  
  
“You want to work for Torchwood  _now_ ,” Pete clarified.  
  
The Doctor rocked on his heels. “Soon as possible, really, it’s quite dull at home, so if there’s some form I need to sign, perhaps we could…” He waved one hand, gesturing to speed up the process.  
  
But Pete didn’t move. He stayed in his chair, still regarding the Doctor with a skeptical look of distrust. “Are you sure this isn’t…” He paused, and the Doctor could see him struggling to formulate the least offensive sentence possible. “…a rash decision?”  
  
“A ‘rash decision’? Am I trying to get a job or a tattoo?” The Doctor raised both eyebrows. “Are you honestly  _hesitating_? You’ve wanted me to work for Torchwood for years.”  
  
“And you’ve been refusing for years.” Pete sat back in his chair, an apologetic look on his face that infuriated the Doctor. “You’ve got to admit it’s strange. You’re qualified, I’m not denying that—”   
  
“Qualified?” The Doctor leaned forward, both hands on Pete’s desk, his voice low. “I’ve got more experience than any employee you’ve ever had or will have. I’m the single best person for the job on this entire wretched planet. You need me.”  
  
“We’ve done just fine without you for years."  
  
There was a moment of silence, and then the Doctor shoved himself upright, stuffed his hands in his pockets and took two steps back. He held Pete’s gaze silently, his mouth in a thin, straight line.  
  
There was another stretch of silence, and then Pete faltered, sighed, and leaned forward.  
  
“It’s not that I don’t want you working for Torchwood,” he explained. “You’re right – you’ve got more experience than anyone else, and you’re a genius. You’d be a fantastic asset.” He frowned. “But I only want you working for us because you want to, and you’ve always hated Torchwood. I can’t see why that should change now.” He paused again, and somehow the Doctor knew precisely what Pete was going to say just before he said it. “Rose was killed working for Torchwood.”  
  
“I know that,” the Doctor snapped, “I—”  
  
“If you think working here will somehow make it easier I can guarantee you it will do the opposite.” Pete gestured towards the photograph on his desk. “Everyone in this building worked with Rose. Everyone in this building lost a friend on that team. The entire building is grieving, Doctor. If you think you can hide from it here, that Torchwood will help you forget – I’m sorry, but you’re wrong.” He folded his hands on his desk and looked at the Doctor with the sort of concern Jackie had been wearing for days, the sort of concern that drove the Doctor mad. “Wouldn’t you rather work somewhere else? Somewhere less… overwhelming?”  
  
“There’s nothing I could do that would help me forget Rose,” said the Doctor, firm but quiet. “I want to work for Torchwood.”  
  
Still, Pete looked uncomfortable. “I really think—”  
  
“I need a reason to make myself get out of bed every morning,” the Doctor admitted finally, though he kept his voice cold and closed off. “Defending the Earth is a good one, and one Rose would be proud of. I want to work for Torchwood.”  
  
For a long moment Pete was silent, his eyes locked on the Doctor’s. Then, at last, he nodded. “Welcome to the team, Doctor.”  
  
***  
  
The Doctor threw himself into working at Torchwood with a focus that he’d never quite shown before. Memories of Rose were everywhere—from the worn seat of her office chair, to the dent in the floor from the time they shagged on her desk, to her leftover lunch still sitting in the fridge—but he learned to ignore it. He focused mostly on alien technology, salvaging what he could for Torchwood and secretly making off with anything he thought would be too dangerous in their hands.  
  
Weeks passed. Life settled itself into a routine. He came home late, slept restlessly, woke up early and returned to the office.  
  
He wondered if he was finally learning what it meant to be human.  
  
Most other employees avoided him. He could hear snatches of whispers in the hall and elevators as he passed. He was Rose’s mysterious widower, the one who knew exactly how and when to destroy the aliens who killed her. They were nervous about talking to him directly, but seemed fascinated by the depth of his knowledge and his history with Rose.   
  
After his first month on the job, he returned home late in the evening to find Jackie sitting at his kitchen table and rifling through a stack of mostly unopened mail.  
  
“Jackie,” he said in greeting. He tossed his keys on the counter and then raised his eyebrows in her direction.  
  
She jumped, looking momentarily guilty. “I’ve got a key,” she said, sounding defensive. She stood up. “Rose gave it to me.”  
  
He felt a sharp pang at Rose’s name, but tried not to let it show. “Right,” he said, rocking back on his heels. “Um… what exactly are you doing here?”  
  
“I’m checking up on you,” Jackie said like it was obvious. Then, without further explanation, she closed the distance between them and wrapped him in a hug. “Hardly seen you, these last few weeks. Ever since you started that job.”  
  
“Yeah,” said the Doctor, hugging her back and feeling unexpectedly choked up. “I’ve been keeping busy.”  
  
Jackie squeezed him one more time and then released him. “I’m worried about you,” she said. “Can’t be good for you, working for the same place that got Rose killed.”  
  
“This sort of thing is what I’m best at.”  
  
“She left you money,” Jackie said. She pointed to the table where an opened stack of cheques sat in an untouched pile. Her gaze met his, eyes softening. “You look exhausted, sweetheart. She wouldn’t want you doing this to yourself.”  
  
“Jackie,” he said, and he sounded tired—so old and so tired. “I’m coping the only way I know how.”  
  
He glanced at the cheques, feeling this strange tightening in his stomach. How could he explain how  _wrong_ it felt that he should profit off Rose’s death? It disgusted to think that her dying meant he was now rich.  
  
Jackie came up behind him. “She’d want to know you were being looked after.”  
  
“She’d  _want_  to be here.”  
  
Jackie’s sigh was impatient and frustrated. “Oh, sit down. I’ll make us a cuppa.”  
  
Something in her voice told him not to argue. He hastily sat down, watching as she easily made her way through his kitchen, setting the kettle and pulling out mugs like she knew it as well as her own.  
  
In his time with Rose, the Doctor had come to realize that he didn’t dislike Jackie quite as much as he thought. He’d even come to accept that he was fond of her. But he’d always thought of her as a slightly annoying distraction that they had better hurry up and placate before she made them stay for dinner.  
  
Now, though… he was surprised by how grateful he was for her presence. He almost smiled. Who would have thought there would ever come a time when Jackie Tyler was the only person left that he felt well and truly attached to?  
  
“There you go, dear,” she said, nudging a mug of tea in his direction. She sat down across from him and they descended into silence.  
  
His tea was bitterer than he usually took it, but he decided that it suited him. He found himself enjoying the quiet company and did his best to ignore the cheques sitting on the table between them.  
  
“I remember was it was like, after losing Pete,” Jackie said, breaking the silence. She stared into her tea mug, not looking in his direction. “I had Rose, of course, and our marriage had been rocky from the start, but sometimes I felt like I might never be happy again.”  
  
The Doctor took a swig of tea and didn’t answer.  
  
“It got better, though, over time,” Jackie continued. “All hurts do in the end. I know this isn’t quite the same—and I know Rose is one more face in the long line of people you’ve lost, but one day you might surprise yourself.”  
  
“Right,” he said. People loved telling him to “give it time.” He never bothered to remind them that he had once known a thing or two about time. Time Lords lived long enough to move on, but never long enough to forget.  
  
Jackie looked at him thoughtfully. “You could try seeing a grief counsellor.”  
  
“A  _what_?”  
  
“Friend of mine lost his wife a few years back,” she said. “There they were, celebrating their anniversary, when some drunk idiot sped through a red light and crashed into the passenger side. Killed her in seconds. There was nothing he could do.”   
  
He felt slightly ill. “Jackie—”  
  
“Took him years of therapy to recover,” Jackie said. “But you know what, Doctor? He didn’t just stop. He went on. Even remarried in time. That could be you one day.”  
  
He hurriedly took another sip of tea to avoid answering.  
  
“I can look up the bloke he saw, if you want.” She paused and then, speaking mostly to herself, said, “What was his name? Adam? David? Allistair?”  
  
“Jackie, I don’t need to see someone. I’m fine, honestly. I am. Well, not entirely fine, but… I’m coping.”  
  
“Well, then,” said Jackie. She took a sip of tea, looking oddly smug. “Don’t suppose you’ll mind coming by for dinner tomorrow night, then. That couple from the university will be there. The ones who did that thing with physics?”  
  
“The experiment that disproved the existence of  _string theory_?”   
  
“Oh, I dunno, I never listen when they go on about it,” said Jackie, much to the Doctor's horror. She set down her mug of tea. “You always loved talking to them, though, and don’t try and convince me otherwise.” She paused, smiling. “How does seven work for you?”  
  
He sighed. He supposed it was worth the trade off if it meant getting out of going for therapy. “I’ll be there.”  
  
***  
  
Dinner at Jackie’s went more smoothly than he was expecting. He showed up with a bottle of wine and didn’t flinch when Jackie pulled him in for an enthused hug. He easily slipped into a discussion on physics with Professor Zhang and had Tony in hysterics when he exploded his peas using his semi-functional sonic screwdriver.  
  
It was like slipping into a worn and familiar pair of trousers. And he was exhausted by it.  
  
After the Zhangs bid their farewells and Pete disappeared to put Tony to bed, the Doctor and Jackie migrated to the living room, each of them nursing a glass of wine. Jackie sat on the end of the sofa, leaving her wine glass perched on the edge of the coffee table. The Doctor hung back in the entrance, leaning back against the wall.  
  
Jackie smiled proudly in his direction, reminding him of a mother hen. “Fit right in, didn’t you? Don’t tell me you didn’t enjoy yourself.”  
  
He managed a shrug and a half smile. “Watch out for those Zhangs. Those two are smart enough to change the world.”  
  
Jackie took a sip of wine, holding back a smirk. “Pete says you’re too focused on work, that you don’t care about anything else. But that’s not true, is it? I know Rose is gone, but you’ve still got us, Doctor.”  
  
He rubbed at the back of his neck, feeling uncomfortable. “Right.” He cleared his throat. “Thanks.”  
  
Jackie downed a few sips of wine and then pushed herself to her feet. “There’s something I want to show you.” She crossed to the desk, stumbling slightly on her feet. “Rose would murder me if she knew I was doing this, but...” her voice turned softer, “not much she can do about it now, is there? And she’d want you to have these.”  
  
The Doctor felt something in his chest tighten and he instinctively tipped the rest of the wine back. He felt it burn down his throat before settling heavily in his stomach. “If it’s private…” he began.  
  
But Jackie had the top of the desk drawer open and she pulled out a pile of letters, sitting in a cardboard box. She set the box down on the table, teeth worrying at her bottom lip in a gesture that was so reminiscent of Rose that he felt dizzy.  
  
“Rose wrote them to you,” Jackie explained. She reached out and touched the first letter, struggling to hold back her tears. “From when you were separated. She wrote most of them during those first few months—she was such a mess, Doctor. I thought… I didn’t know what to think. Sometimes I hated you.”  
  
Jackie handed him the box of letters and he reached out to grasp it, feeling heavy and uncoordinated. He fumbled with the top letter, finally managing to unfold it. He read it quickly, leaning heavily back against the wall.

>   
> Doctor,
> 
> It’s been almost a month now and I keep seeing the TARDIS everywhere. I know that she’s gone, but it’s like… every time a plane flies overhead or I turn a corner and see a flash of blue, a part of me hopes it might be her.
> 
> It’s not even travelling all of time and space that I miss – that’s too simple. It was being with you, being part of our team of two. I should have told you that, yeah? It never mattered where we were, not at the end. I would have gone with you anywhere.
> 
> Sounds almost pathetic writing it out like that, though, doesn’t it? I suppose there were many things we should have told each other.
> 
> Pete reckons I should start working for Torchwood – that it might help take my mind off things. Dunno, though. The lot of them carry guns, and after everything that happened at Canary Wharf... I hate thinking you might be disappointed in me.
> 
> Not that you’ll ever see this.
> 
> Rose

  
  
He leaned his head back against the wall, eyes falling shut. The letters sat heavily in his hands. He didn’t know whether he wanted to read them one by one and savour this last glimpse of Rose or whether he should hide them away so he wouldn’t have to face the reminder of her loss again and again.   
  
“Seemed to help her,” Jackie said, interrupting his thoughts. “Maybe you could…”  
  
“Right,” he interrupted before she got further along in that line of thought. Clearing his throat, he opened his suit jacket, carefully filing the letters inside one of the inner pockets. Even there, he still felt weighed down by their very presence.  
  
The sound of someone running down the stairs broke the tension in the room. The Doctor and Jackie glanced at each other and then shot out into the hall, nearly running into Pete.  
  
“Going somewhere?” said the Doctor. He forced himself to focus on Pete, but the world around him felt hazy and vague.  
  
“Invasion,” said Pete, chest heaving. “The whole sky above London is lighting up—they’re coming in from all directions.”  
  
The Doctor nodded. Forcing himself to pay attention, he said, “Torchwood?”  
  
“Good plan,” said Pete. “I’ll brief you on the way.” He leaned in, pressing a quick kiss to Jackie’s lips. “The meal was amazing, Jacks. That cook of yours outdid herself.”  
  
“Oi,” said Jackie, smacking him lightly on the shoulder. Then she frowned at each of them, eyes lingering on the Doctor. “You two, you be careful. I mean that.”  
  
“Always am,” said the Doctor mildly, unconsciously patting the part of his jacket where Rose's letters were hidden.  
  
****  
  
By the time they reached Torchwood, it was already in a state of all-hands-on-deck. People swarmed in and out of the control room, talking amongst themselves in low, urgent tones. A dozen different computer monitors blinked around the room, flashing various graphs and satellite readings. Everyone seemed to have a headset on, and the adrenaline in the air was tangible. Pete strode into the room at once and headed straight to a free computer, but the Doctor lingered by the doorway.  
  
It was the first genuine alien appearance in the Doctor’s time working for Torchwood. The Doctor had witnessed the atmosphere before, but only ever as a third party. Dozens of times Rose had called him in to help with whatever they were dealing with, and he’d stood in this same room, watching with a slight fascination as Torchwood scrambled to deal with the threat. Rose had been a genius at managing the chaos, capable of winning people over in a calm way that he’d never really mastered. He could picture her there easily, weaving through her coworkers and greeting him with that adventurous grin that always matched his.  
  
A cold sensation pooled in his stomach, and the Doctor mentally reprimanded himself, shoving the image of Rose as far back in his mind as he could.  _She’s dead_ , he told himself.  _She’s dead and you’ve got other things to worry about._  
  
“Right.” He strode to the nearest Torchwood employee, standing behind her chair and peering at her computer screen. “What’s going on?”  
  
“We’ve got ten ships planet-bound,” she said – what was her name? Jean? Janice? Janet? She looked up at him, eyes wide. “ _Ten_! Just came out of nowhere, all at once! None have entered the atmosphere yet, they’re just… there.”  
  
The man at the next computer spun around in his chair. Richard, was it? “We can’t contact them,” he told the Doctor. “We’ve tried every signal, every frequency, every method we could think of. Nothing. If we’re getting through, they’re not responding.” Richard looked around at those behind him, and the Doctor very suddenly became aware that everyone in the room was watching him. “We’re, ah, debating how to proceed.”  
  
The Doctor gave a perfunctory nod, his gaze traveling back to Jean-Janice-Janet’s computer screen. “Ten ships?”  
  
Jean-Janice-Janet nodded.  
  
“Right.” The Doctor shoved his hands into his pockets. “Shoot them down.”  
  
There was a momentary ripple of silence, and then, from the far corner, the Doctor heard Pete. “What?”  
  
Richard swiveled uncomfortably in his chair. “We… well, we were thinking you might have an idea how to open up a communications channel with them—”  
  
“You don’t need a communications channel,” the Doctor said simply, shaking his head. “They’re invading. Shoot them down.”  
  
Richard and Jean-Janice-Janet exchanged looks but stayed silent, their mouths ajar. Pete, on the other hand, was already halfway across the room.  
  
“Absolutely not,” he said, his voice firm. “We don't know that. We haven’t talked to them, we—”  
  
“If they were interested in talking, they’d be hailing us.” The Doctor raised his eyebrows and held his ground. “You don’t send ten ships to say ‘hello’. It’s an invasion. Shoot them down.”  
  
Pete shook his head, resolute. “We’re not shooting anything until we know why they’re here.”  
  
"I agree," said a woman in the corner named Elizabeth. “We can’t act until we know. We’ve got to give them a chance, they might be harmless.”  
  
The Doctor fought back the urge to roll his eyes. Leave it to Torchwood to suddenly develop a concern for alien welfare in the middle of an invasion. “We do know,” he insisted, “I’m telling you, it’s an invasion, they—”  
  
“They’re getting closer,” Jean-Janice-Janet interrupted, her eyes trained on her computer screen. “They’ll be entering the atmosphere soon – three minutes, at this rate—”  
  
The Doctor directed his attention toward Torchwood's most powerful computer, the one capable of firing the strongest weapons. “Shoot them down."  
  
The man at the computer hesitated. “We’re ready to fire, but—”  
  
“Don’t!” Pete strode across the room, headed for the computer. “Not until we know what they want.”  
  
“We know what they want,” the Doctor snapped. In a few long strides he was standing across from Pete, the man at his computer sitting awkwardly between them. “I’m telling you,” the Doctor told him, “shoot them down.”  
  
“Two minutes twenty seconds!” chimed Jean-Janice-Janet.  
  
“Ignore him, Mark.” Pete met the Doctor’s eye and squared his shoulders. “You’re not in charge, Doctor.”  
  
The irritation the Doctor was feeling suddenly seemed to increase exponentially. “You honestly want to wait until you’ve let ten ships land around the world before you do anything about it? Oh, that’s a brilliant plan, classic Torchwood, endanger the planet first, then try to contain the mess. Well done.”  
  
Mark shifted awkwardly between them.  
  
“Two minutes,” said Jean-Janice-Janet.  
  
“We’re not responding like it’s an invasion just because you’ve got a hunch,” Pete snapped. “It might be something else—”  
  
“Like what?” The Doctor was distantly aware that his voice had risen several decibels. “A  _free trade agreement_?”  
  
The room fell silent, and the Doctor was suddenly very aware of his own heartbeat. It was incredibly loud, between the pounding in his chest and the rush of blood in his ears. Across from him, Pete looked at him with an expression of infuriating understanding.  
  
“One minute forty seconds,” chimed in Jean-Janice-Janet.  
  
“I know you miss Rose,” began Pete, in a voice so patronizing the Doctor wanted to reach over and throttle him.  
  
As it was, he clenched one hand into a fist and spoke low and deadly. “Rose has nothing to do with this.” He looked at Mark. “Shoot them down.”  
  
“If it was anyone else, you’d say they were over-reacting. Looking for revenge.”  
  
The Doctor grit his teeth. “ _Shoot them down_ , Mark.”  
  
“One minute twenty seconds,” said Jean-Janice-Janet.  
  
“You’ve done it before,” Pete went on. “We’ve lost team members before and you’ve lectured us for wanting to punish those responsible. _And you were right_.”  
  
The Doctor stared hard at Mark’s computer, watching the tiny blips on the screen inch closer and closer. It would be harder, so much harder once they entered the atmosphere, once they landed… “Mark, now.”  
  
“I’m sorry you lost her,” said Pete. “I know how it feels to lose the woman you love—”  
  
“One minute!”  
  
“—but killing anything that dares get to close to our planet isn’t going to bring her back.”  
  
The Doctor gripped the back of Mark’s chair and the edge of his desk, leaning in. “Listen to me, Mark, the second those ships enter the atmosphere—”  
  
"You've already killed the people responsible for her death," Pete carried on, raising his voice and making it impossible to ignore. "It  _ends there_."  
  
“—they’re going to be impossible to contain. You let them land and they are invading, then what? War?” He raised his eyebrows. “Think this planet’s ready for that? How many casualties, do you think? Hundreds? Thousands? Millions?”  
  
Pete was shouting, now. “You can’t exact revenge on the entire universe, Doctor!”  
  
“Thirty seconds!” called Jean-Janice-Janet.  
  
The Doctor and Pete looked at each other, then looked at Mark expectantly. Between them, Mark looked utterly befuddled.  
  
“I… I don’t…” he looked from the Doctor to Pete, evidently at a loss. He opened and closed his mouth a few more times without making any kind of coherent noise.  
  
The Doctor shook his head, barely biting back a growl of frustration. “Fine,” he said, resolved. “Allow me.” With both hands on Mark’s chair, the Doctor rolled him out of the way and took to the keyboard himself.  
  
“Doctor,” said Pete urgently, “ _no_ —”  
  
The Doctor ignored him. Pete moved forward, but the Doctor was faster; with a few quick keystrokes the shots were fired.  
  
A heavy silence descended on the room. The Doctor straightened up and shoved his hands in his pockets, well aware that he was once again the centre of attention and that Pete was sending him a fierce glare. The Doctor found it difficult to care.  
  
“Um… first target eliminated,” said Jean-Janice-Janet quietly. She watched the Doctor with a look he couldn't read. "The rest have scattered. They're leaving."  
  
Pete's voice was a quiet, deadly tone the Doctor recognized as one he often used himself. "How many people on board, do you reckon, Doctor?"  
  
"No idea." The Doctor drew himself to his full height and shook his head. "But since the six point seven billion people on this planet are still safe, so I’d say that's a Torchwood job well done." Then he turned and left the room, thinking of the letters in his breast pocket and marveling at the bizarrely hollow feeling that filled his body.  
  
  
  
\--

 


	3. Chapter 3

  
The following day at Torchwood was the tensest the Doctor had experienced. If he’d thought the rest of the staff was scared of him before, they were terrified of him now. No one quite seemed to meet his eye, and any verbal acknowledgements were monosyllabic at best.

It suited the Doctor just fine. He hadn’t started at Torchwood to meet people or to make friends; he’d started at Torchwood because there were twenty-four hours in a day and he wanted to spend as few of them as possible in the flat he’d once shared with Rose.

Nonetheless, he couldn’t pretend he was surprised when he was asked to meet “Director Tyler” in his office.

“Pete,” he said in greeting, giving a tight nod as he entered the room.

From behind his desk, Pete looked weary and tired. He gestured to the door with one hand, the other rubbing his forehead. “Shut the door, will you?”

The Doctor did as he was asked and crossed the room to Pete’s desk, feeling a dull sense of wariness and foreboding. He was fairly certain that nothing good could come from being asked to shut the door to your boss’ office.

“Sit down,” said Pete.

The Doctor glanced at the chair. “I’d rather stand.”

“Sit down,” Pete repeated, and after a moment’s hesitation, the Doctor complied.

From his seat the Doctor couldn’t see the front of the photograph on Pete’s desk, but he studied the back of the picture frame intensely, one hand reaching into the breast pocket where he still kept the letters from Rose. He hadn’t yet read another one, though he’d been sorely tempted. They were a last living relic of Rose, the last time she’d ever address him, however remotely, and keeping them unread felt like keeping them—and her—alive. The incredible, heartbreaking sensation that Rose was with him even now wouldn’t last beyond that first read, and the Doctor was determined to preserve that as long as possible.

There was a grind of wood against wood as Pete opened a drawer to his desk and pulled out a small, square object. He tossed it towards the Doctor, who caught it in both hands. “Do you know what that is?”

The Doctor ran around in his hands a few times, inspecting it, appreciating the cool feel of the alien metal. “Sure.” He held it up to the light, squinting at it. “It’s… well, it’s like a black box. Alien black box, sort of. All sorts of information in one of these – type of craft, planet of origin, number of passengers, purpose of the voyage, all that.”

Pete nodded. He turned to face the Doctor directly and folded his hands, resting his elbows on his desk. “A Torchwood employee named Toshiko Sato tracked and found that one yesterday.” He held out his hand, and the Doctor gave him back the device. “It’s from the ship you shot down. Made it through the atmosphere.”

The Doctor kept his hand outstretched. “I can read it, I—”

“No need.” Pete put the device back in his desk drawer. “Toshiko already has.”

The Doctor felt a chill slither down his spine. “They were invading.”

“No.” Though the Doctor stared intently at Pete’s desk, he saw the movement as Pete shook his head. “They were tourists.”

The Doctor’s head jerked up instinctively. “What?”

“Tourists, Doctor,” Pete said again, a hint of steely anger buried in his tone. “Earth was part of the package. The scenic route, as it were.”

Disbelief tingled throughout the Doctor’s body. “But there were ten ships,” he reasoned, distantly aware of the way his voice was shaking. “You don’t send ten cruise liners to the same island, that’s – that’s – well, that’s—”

“That’s what happened.”

For a long moment the Doctor sat in silence, barely aware of anything aside from his own rapidly increasing heart rate. His mouth was dry, and so he swallowed twice to find his voice. “How many?” he whispered.

Pete looked for a moment as though he wasn’t going to answer, but finally said, “Eighty in each ship, plus crew.”

A wave of nausea wracked through the Doctor’s body. He closed his eyes and bowed his head, trying to stave off the feeling that he was going to be sick. Eighty, plus crew. _Eighty—_

“I’m sorry, Doctor,” he heard Pete say, “but there’s absolutely no way I can overlook this. You disregarded authority and acted in an irrational, emotional manner that cost eighty innocent people their lives. I can’t let that happen again.”

The Doctor laughed, the absurdity of the situation slowly seeping in. “Are you sacking me?”

“You’re not fit to work here. Right now, you may not be fit to work anywhere.” Pete’s stare was hard. “You killed more than eighty innocent tourists in an economic downturn. There could easily be much worse ramifications than a sacking.”

The Doctor’s lip twitched humourlessly. “Yeah.”

“Toshiko has agreed to keep quiet about it.” Pete leaned across the desk and dropped his voice. “I’ll protect you this once,” he said, “because Rose loved you, and Jacks and Tony love you, and you’re family. But this absolutely cannot happen again, and if it does…” He shrugged. “You’re on your own.”

The Doctor nodded mutely, not fully trusting himself to speak. A strange sort of numbness had begun to spread throughout his body, competing with the nausea. He stared at his hands as they trembled in his lap.

Pete stood. “I think you should go home, Doctor.”

The Doctor laughed. “Home. Yeah.” He stayed seated, staring intently at the back of the picture frame on Pete’s desk. “And do what?”

Pete frowned. “I don’t—”

The Doctor laughed again, finally tearing his gaze away from the photo and looking at Pete. Suddenly he felt panicked and trapped and _terrified_ , his breathing coming in short, quick breaths. “What am I supposed to do for the next, oh, fifty years, stuck on this planet in this pathetic human body?" He could see the timeline stretching out before him, a long, useless human life without respite or purpose. The other universe, at least, had needed him to do its dirty work. " _What the hell am I supposed to do?_ ”

“I don’t know.” Pete shrugged. “Buy a new flat. Take a holiday. See that grief counselor Jackie knows. You need to figure out who you are without Rose.”

The problem was, the Doctor thought, he knew exactly who he was without Rose. He was the sort of man who shot down a ship full of tourists on the off chance they might be invading. He thought of Rose, nineteen years old with dark roots and loose jeans, protecting a Dalek. _What about you, Doctor? What the hell are you changing into?_

Trying to calm his breathing, the Doctor stood on shaky legs and nodded. “Yeah.”

***  
The first thing he did was cash his inheritance cheques from Rose. Then he went out and bought booze.

The Doctor had never bought alcohol with the sole purpose of getting drunk before. As a Time Lord, he’d enjoyed the social aspect of drinking, but he’d never _really_ felt the effects until he turned human. He was fairly lightweight in this body, and so had made a conscious effort not to overdo it.

Now it seemed fitting. That’s what humans did, wasn’t it? Hit rock bottom, destroy a bus load of tourists, and reach for a shot glass.

Evening was descending when he finally arrived back at the flat. The light on the answering machine blinked with a new message from Jackie, but he ignored it. Instead he strode into the living room where he set a bottle of whiskey down on the coffee table. Then he reached into his jacket, pulling out the package of letters from Rose. He tossed them on the table next to the whiskey.

He stared at the letters for a moment, considering. Was this how he wanted to spend his very last moments with Rose? Getting drunk, alone, as night fell over London?

 _Yeah_ , he thought, and reached for the whiskey. At least if he was pissed out of his mind, he’d be less likely to kill people.

He unscrewed the cap and brought it to his lips, taking a deep swig. The alcohol burned down his throat before pooling heavily in his stomach. He pulled the bottle sharply away and coughed into his arm. Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he took another swig before setting the bottle back down on the table.

He glanced at the pile of letters and then reached for them, hands shaking. He grabbed the whiskey with his free hand, swallowing a mouthful before carefully resting the bottle against his thigh, wedged in the corner of the sofa.

He studied the first letter. It was folded in two and he could just make out Rose’s dark and messy handwriting under the folded page. He drew his glasses out of his pocket, hooking them on his nose before unfolding the first letter.

He read them one-by-one. He read about Rose’s hopelessness after their separation and her determination after Bad Wolf Bay. He read about how building the dimension cannon gave her a reason to get up in the mornings and keep pushing forward. He read about Tony’s first birthday party and Rose’s quick promotion up the ranks of Torchwood. He read about her first alien invasion at Torchwood and the first time she woke up in the hospital after a mission gone wrong.

Finally, dates between the letters increased and then stopped altogether sometime around the beginning of the darkness. He folded down the last letter and reached for the whiskey, realizing it was far lighter than it had been. A dull headache pounded in the back of his head, but the whiskey was doing its job. He felt numb—numb to Torchwood and Rose and the look in Pete’s eyes when he told him he’d destroyed a spaceship of harmless tourists.

He stretched out on the sofa, cradling the whiskey bottle in front of him, hovering near his lips. He reached blindly for the television remote, finger hitting the corner of the table before grasping it. He clicked the telly on and fumbled for another drink as a late night ITV talk show filled the screen.

The room was beginning to spin. He closed his eyes, dozing against the backdrop of a cheerful ITV talk show host covering the news.

He dreamed about Rose right before she died, showing off her new suit and kissing him over toast. "Diplomacy is sort of the key word here," she'd said, but he should have known. He remembered running towards the Thames, feet pounding against the pavement, chest heaving with exertion. But he hadn’t been fast enough. They took her and they killed her and he hadn’t been there to stop it.

He jerked awake as something in his stomach churned violently. A rock band was playing on the telly, casting a strobe of light around the room. He struggled to sit up, nausea building in his stomach. Pressing his arm to his mouth he rolled off the sofa and half stumbled, half crawled to the toilet. There, he leaned over and threw up.

It seemed to go on and on. His throat and nose burned and he gasped for air as his stomach violently recoiled.

Finally, panting, he stopped and slid to his bum, resting against the toilet with his arms linked around his knees. Only then did he notice he was still holding the whiskey bottle. He felt a wave of disgust with himself and rested his head against the cool ivory of the toilet seat, breathing in deeply.

He used to be a Time Lord--he had held all of time and space in his hands. He had saved worlds and changed the past. And now...

Now he was the sort of person who shot down innocent people and who could only cope by feeling nothing at all. The problem was, he thought, as he pushed himself to his feet, alcohol could numb the wound for a while, but it eventually came rushing back up.

He turned to the washbasin and caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. A pale face, dark eyebrows, and dry lips stared back at him. Once he had thought it was a face he could live and die with, but he suddenly missed his ability to regenerate with a fierceness that surprised him. Regenerating had always meant being given a second chance.

He turned away and flushed the toilet. He cleaned himself up without looking into the mirror again. Then, with the taste of vomit still fresh in his mouth, he bent down and retrieved the whiskey bottle before plodding his way back to the living room.

It took him a moment to notice that it was quiet—so quiet that he could hear the German shepherd down the hall whining to be fed. He paused, listening intently for the telly.

Nothing.

That couldn't be right--he was sure he'd left the television on. Pushing forward, he turned into the living room and gasped. The whiskey bottle fell from his hand, rolling along the floor and spilling amber liquid across the carpet. But he barely noticed—his entire focus was on the television.

It was Rose.

A breath of air whooshed out of him and he stumbled closer, falling to his knees in front of the TV.

“Rose,” he croaked, voice sounding scratchy and foreign.

The Rose image on the screen mouthed his name, eyes desperately sweeping over the room—no, not the room. The TV wasn’t a camera. She couldn’t see him.

This was a message, then. Fingers feeling heavy and useless, he jabbed at the volume, turning it up all the way.

“Doctor—” his heart soared at the sound of her voice, “I really hope you can hear this. I’m... well, I dunno exactly. I reckon—” there was a crackle of static and Rose’s face vanished before reappearing, “—miles away from Earth. I—” The video cut out again and when Rose reappeared, she was grainy and translucent. “—don’t have much time. They’re still after me, but I’m staying one step—”

The image began to flicker. “No, no, no,” the Doctor mumbled. He pulled out the sonic screwdriver and pointed it at the screen.

Rose solidified in sharp focus. “—really miss you,” she said, with a sad smile.

Then she vanished. A second later, ITV’s talk show filled the screen again. An interview with an American Senator blared through the apartment.

“No,” he whispered. “NO.” He turned the sonic screwdriver to its highest frequency. The screen snapped and crackled, but Rose didn’t come back.

“Oh, no you don’t,” he repeated. He pushed himself to his feet and then brought one fist down on the TV. The image on the screen filled with white static and he hung his head as the American blathered on about the ills of socialized medicine.

He gulped in a breath of air. And then another one. Finally, he pulled himself upright and headed toward the door.

Rose was alive. She was _alive_.

And nothing would stop him from getting her back.  


\--


	4. Chapter 4

Eight hours after learning he’d killed a spaceship of tourists and been sacked, the Doctor stormed back into Torchwood. Only a skeleton crew worked the nightshift, and Jean-Janice-Janet was the first to notice him.

“Sir!” she said as he made his way through the Hub, heading towards Pete’s office. “Sir!”

He ignored her and she jumped up, jogging to keep up with his long strides. He noticed that she made an effort to stay a good foot away from him. Good, he decided. He’d proved just how dangerous he was when he shot down innocent people.

What had his other self said? _Born in battle, filled with blood and anger and revenge._ Well, he’d got one thing right.

Jean-Janice-Janet almost looked apologetic. “Sir, you can’t be here. I’ll have to call security.”

“I just want to speak with Pete.”

“You’re no longer authorized to be on the premises.”

The Doctor spun around, moving into her space. “I am going to talk to Pete.”

Jean-Janice-Janet’s mouth fell open like she wasn’t sure whether she was frightened or flattered by how close he was. Without another word, the Doctor dodged around her and barged into Pete’s office.

Pete was on the phone and the Doctor took a seat. “Good,” he said as Pete jumped. “You’re still working.”

“Sorry Jenson, something urgent has come up. I’ll have to call you back.” Pete hung up, eyes sweeping over the Doctor. “My god,” he said slowly, “you look terrible.”

“I killed eighty innocent people and destroyed the lives of countless others. And I got sacked,” said the Doctor. “I’ve had better days.”

“Fair enough,” said Pete, rocking back slightly in his chair. “I’m still trying to clean up your mess, by the way. Any chance you might be willing to leave on your own or do I have to call security?”

The Doctor decided to cut right to the point. “Rose is alive.”

Pete’s reaction wasn’t entirely unexpected. He heaved a great sigh and with the air of someone who was rapidly running out of patience said, “Doctor, you’re an intelligent man. You can’t honestly believe that.”

“She contacted me,” said the Doctor. “She’s out there right now—she’s alone and she’s lost and I will get her back, with or without your help.”

“Oh my god, you’ve gone completely mad,” said Pete, scrubbing a hand over his face.

“I know what I saw.”

Pete pulled his hand away and really looked at him. His expression turned to one of vague disgust. “Are you drunk?”

The Doctor shifted uncomfortably. “That’s... hardly the point.”

Pete pressed a button on his phone. “I’d like a man removed from my office. Now.”

“She’s alive and I can prove it,” the Doctor pressed. “I’m not expecting you to believe me, but I can prove it. I swear I can.”

Pete looked up from the phone. “Doctor, do us a favour? Get some help. Talk to someone. If you won’t do it for me, do it for Jackie. Losing Rose has been hard enough. I can’t watch her lose you as well.”

“I know what I saw,” the Doctor repeated. “You can have me thrown out if you want. But you can’t stop me.”

Pete shook his head. “And I can’t keep protecting you.”

The door to Pete’s office burst open and four security personnel piled inside.

The Doctor surveyed them quickly. “Ah, Charles! Pete’s head of security!” said the Doctor, giving a little wave. “Hello, again! Nice to see you.”

The guards glanced at each other and then at Pete. “Just... get him out of here,” said Pete, sounding exhausted. Then, after a pause, added, “And make sure he gets home safely.”

Without a word, two of the guards grabbed the Doctor under the arms and hauled him to his feet. Charles darted behind him, pulling his hands into a pair of cuffs.

The Doctor sought out Pete’s gaze. “I imagine Jackie will be interested to know her daughter could still be alive,” he said mildly. “And that her husband couldn’t be arsed to do anything about it.”

Pete hesitated. "She won't believe you."

"Are you sure?" said the Doctor. "Are you absolutely sure that Jackie Tyler would do nothing if she had even a shred of hope that Rose might be alive?"

Pete’s eyes closed briefly and the Doctor grinned, tilting heavily to one side before leaning against one of the guards. Despite the adrenaline pumping through him, he was still light-headed from the whiskey. But for the first time in weeks, he felt oddly in control.

Finally, Pete said, “You said you have proof?”

“Oh, yes,” said the Doctor. “All we have to do is dig up her body.”

***

The Doctor took enough time to go home, shower, and change. A dull headache pounded in his temples by the time he arrived back at Torchwood, but he ignored it. Finding Rose was the only thing that mattered.

He insisted on performing the autopsy. “Clearly you lot weren’t competent enough to detect a fake body the first time around,” he’d told Pete. “I’ll handle this one, thanks very much.”

A crowd of people gathered outside the laboratory. Pete was there, along with an unnecessarily large contingent of security and military personnel. The Doctor imagined the extra security was in case in turned out he really was mad and made the whole thing up. The crowd also included several of Rose’s co-workers, along with freshly scrubbed Torchwood interns, and Jean-Janice-Janet (whom the Doctor was beginning to suspect might have something of a crush on him). Jackie was waiting down in the hall in a small observatory room—she couldn’t bear to see the body again, she’d said.

The Doctor wasn’t fazed by The Body, as he’d taken to calling it. Now that he knew it wasn’t Rose, he could look past her mangled limbs and shattered bones and focus on the task at hand.

He worked quickly, taking hair and tissue samples and running a few x-rays. Then he turned and gave Pete a thumbs up and a smile.

Pete didn’t smile back. Nor did he think it was excessive to invite the military and security officers into the briefing room.

“The body is basically one big embryo,” he explained as Pete, the security and military personnel, the Torchwood interns, and Jean-Janice-Janet scrambled for seats. “Almost like... like a baby that was never born.” He held up the x-rays. “It’s got all the right organs—heart, lungs, kidneys, all that, but they’re essentially the organs of a one-year-old. The human body experiences wear and tear as it grows older—Rose’s heart should be showing us twenty-nine years of strain.”

Jean-Janice-Janet’s hand shot up in the hair. “So... it’s... what, exactly? A clone?”

“Close,” said the Doctor. Jean-Janice-Janet beamed proudly. “But the technology isn’t quite that advanced. The body could be made from anything—anyone. That’s just the tissue. They grew it and then shaped the outside to make it look like Rose. But they got it all a bit wrong.” He held up the hair samples. “See this? Natural blonde hair. Rose used dye. And this?” He held up a package of fingernails. “They’re perfectly shaped—but they’ve never been painted, never been cut, never been chewed during a long night spent at work. Everything is just... a little too perfect to be real.” He dropped both packages on the table and then shoved his hands in his pockets, adding, “I should have known. I should have realized right away.”

“You couldn’t have known,” said Jean-Janice-Janet fervently.

Much to the Doctor’s surprise, Pete added, “She’s right. You had no reason to think otherwise.” He paused, looking deep in thought. “The question is... who—or what—would go to so much trouble to make us think she was dead?”

“They needed her,” said the Doctor, musing aloud. “Needed her alive, in fact. They reckoned that if we thought she was dead, we would never come looking.” He dropped his voice, tone hardening. “But they forgot one thing.”

“What?” said Pete, looking at him wearily.

“Rose would never go down quietly,” said the Doctor. He drew himself up to his full height. “Whatever they want her for, I can guarantee you it’s not good.”

“Agreed,” said Pete. He jumped to his feet. “Doctor—start working on a way to get her back. The rest of you do as he says. I’m going to talk to my wife.” Pete started off and then suddenly jerked back, as if something had just occurred to him. “Doctor, don’t take this the wrong way, but this is a consult only. You’re not being reinstated in your former position.”

The Doctor nodded. “Fine.”

He didn’t add that he couldn’t blame Pete. Besides, he only had one goal now--getting Rose back. After that, Pete could hire him to scrub the latrines for all he cared.

***

Rose Tyler was humming to herself.

What had started out as a pop song she remembered from her childhood – one that had never existed in this universe, much to her distress – had morphed somewhere along the line into a ballad she remembered from her parents’ “vow renewal” and later transmuted into a lyric-less, improvised hum. It was a quiet hum, and she could barely hear herself over the constant drone of the engines down here in the bowels of the ship, but it was a hum, and it was helping to keep the pace as she fused bits of wire together. Whistle while you work, like Mary Poppins said.

She frowned, biting her bottom lip as she soldered a wire. Hadn’t it been Snow White, once upon a time? Bloody parallel universes. Nine years and it was still threatening to do her head in.

“That looks good,” said a voice, so suddenly that Rose, caught up in her humming, jumped and nearly burned herself. “You’re really getting the hang of it.”

Chastising herself for her paranoia, Rose grinned. “Quick learner.” She held up the tiny soldering gun. “Besides, this is sort of like this… thing my husband has that he’s always playing with, this tool…” She trailed off, noticing the tilt of her friend’s head and narrowing her eyes. “Oi! Screwdriver! It’s a screwdriver.”

Her friend laughed – or, to be more specific, her two long, furry ears twitched, something Rose had come to know was the Trixan version of laughter. Rose thought sometimes that they looked a bit like bipedal bunny rabbits, and she’d decided the comparison, although perhaps not scientifically sophisticated, was reasonably sound. The Trixans were friendly to her, had large families, seemed to have way more energy than humans did, and sometimes Rose had to use every ounce of her maturity and worldliness and consideration not to reach over and scratch their fuzzy heads. Some part of her suspected that if the Doctor were here, he wouldn’t be able to resist at all.

This particular Trixan – Celly, as Rose called her, though her real name was something far too complicated for a human tongue – also happened to be turquoise.

The universe, Rose Tyler learned again and again, was a strange place.

“You may as well put that down,” Celly said, gesturing with one hand towards the tangle of wires Rose was working on and holding up a large canvas bag with the other. “I brought food.”

Rose’s stomach gave an eager growl, and she carefully set down the contraption she’d been working on. It was strange work, what she was doing, and much of it she didn’t understand, but she’d been on the ship for days now and she figured she ought to earn her keep, especially with all the trouble she’d caused. She brushed her hair back behind her ears, careful not to knock her translation earpiece.

It was pure dumb luck that the ship she’d taken refuge on just happened to be inhabited by a species with a specialty in communications technology. Traveling salesmen, Rose had called them, and Celly had assured her the comparison was an appropriate one. It was equally dumb luck that they’d tried stopped at a docking station at the same time her captors had, giving her an opportunity to make a break for it. Though Rose suspected her captors had been in pursuit ever since, the Trixans were sympathetic to her plight and had eluded them so far. The problem was that the Trixans had no idea where Earth was, and Rose, for all her years at Torchwood, had no idea how to direct them.

The earpiece itself, though, was no small miracle. She’d been in space not ten minutes before she’d been cursing the fact that there was no TARDIS to translate for her. But the earpiece worked wonders, allowing her and Celly to understand each other through their own earpieces. It was incredibly convenient, and part of Rose desperately wanted a few prototypes to take back home; Torchwood’s own translation technology was desperately minimal, and half the time it boiled down to “call the Doctor”. He’d miss his designation as interpreter, Rose was sure, but she certainly wouldn’t miss being unable to take part in dialogues herself.

Celly set the bag on Rose’s tiny worktable and Rose shifted to make room on her bench. Trixans were shorter than humans by just enough to make Rose feel awkward and bulky. She imagined the Doctor trying to fit at the table with them, all elbows and knees, and bit back a grin.

“Do you think it worked?” Celly asked, pulling Rose from her thoughts and taking a large box from the canvas bag. “I did my best to mimic a signal your technology might recognize, but without an example to work from it’s quite difficult.”

“Dunno,” said Rose. She dug into a smaller box of something she could only describe as salad. “I hope it did, but I guess I’ll only know when I get home and ask him.”

She popped something leafy and green into her mouth, trying to ignore the sinking feeling she got whenever she thought of the Doctor, no doubt driving himself half-mad in his attempt to find her. She wondered how much time he’d spent scouring London for her, not to mention Earth itself. She had faith in his ability to connect the dots, and she knew he wouldn’t just give up on her, but…

Well, it had been a while. She had no idea how long, exactly – it wasn’t like she could really keep track of Earth time all the way out here – but she was sure it had been weeks at least. She knew he didn’t have the TARDIS, didn’t have the resources he’d once had, but she’d half-expected him to show up in a spaceship he’d nicked from Torchwood. That she’d heard nothing, nothing at all, even after multiple attempts to contact him – well, it didn’t suggest nice things.

What if something had happened to him?

“I never asked,” said Celly, pouring a liberal amount of a viscous sauce onto her plate. “Humans, do you mate for life?”

Rose choked on her pasta. “Do we – oh, God, no. No.” She thought of Jimmy Stone and shuddered, shaking her head. “No, we don’t, thank God.”

Celly nodded, looking bemused but otherwise polite. “But you are quite desperate to get back to one male in particular.”

Rose laughed. “Noticed, did you?” She grinned, but it faded when her thumb reached out to spin her wedding ring and found it missing. Why would they steal her wedding ring? “It’s not just him – I mean, my family, my friends, my whole life’s back on Earth, but…” She shrugged. “Well, the Doctor, he’s… he’s one of a kind, that’s for sure.” She blinked and frowned. “Sort of.” Eager to escape the ache of longing she felt whenever she thought of the Doctor for long, Rose smiled and titled her head. “Do you? Mate for life, I mean.”

Celly shook her head. “No. Most people prefer multiple partners; increases genetic variety.” She shrugged. “But sometimes a mate is exceptional and one chooses to stay with them.”

Rose grinned. “Yeah, that sounds about right.”

“You find this doctor of yours exceptional, then?”

“Yeah.” She nodded, slow at first with a building enthusiasm. “Yeah, I reckon he is.” She made a face at her salad and stabbed it with a frustrated vengeance. “Even if I am always the one who’s got to build dimension cannons and hitch-hike across the galaxy to get back to him.” She lifted her fork and pointed it determinedly at Celly. “And I _will_ get back to him.”

***

“What are you doing?”

The Doctor glanced up, gaze falling on the inquisitive stare of Jean-Janice-Janet. He thought for a second and then said, “Rose contacted me in our flat using our television screen—” He pointed to their telly, now hooked up to various Torchwood computers and other tracking devices. “So I’m trying to reverse its signal.”

“To find out where she is?”

“ _Exactly_ ,” said the Doctor. He pointed his half-built sonic screwdriver at the computers, which lit up encouragingly. “Come on, come _on_ ,” he said before focusing on Jean-Janice-Janet again. “The problem is, Rose is using very new technology to contact very, very old technology. Fortunately, I’m brilliant with… well, most things.”

As he finished, the computers released a spray of orange sparks and then powered down.

Jean-Janice-Janet giggled. “Oh, well done.”

The Doctor frowned. “I never said it wouldn’t take some time.”

“Giving up?”

“Never,” he said seriously, prodding the computers with the sonic screwdriver.

Jean-Janice-Janet watched him re-wire the computers silently before sighing wistfully and saying, “Rose is lucky.”

He jerked up, jamming his finger against one of the computer’s dashboards. Sticking it in his mouth, he mumbled, “What?”

Jean-Janice-Janet looked startled, like she hadn’t meant to say that aloud. “Rose. The way you love her…” she trailed off. “Seems special, is all. Oh, I dunno. I didn’t mean to start sounding like a Hallmark E-card.”

The Doctor made a non-committal noise of agreement and ducked his head, hoping Jean-Janice-Janet would get the hint and leave him be.

 _I shot down a ship full of tourists_ , he thought about telling her. _Innocent people—and I destroyed them._ He wondered if Jean-Janice-Janet would still think Rose was lucky if she knew what he’d done.

Jean-Janice-Janet let out a long sigh, the kind that was almost impossible to ignore. He raised his head to find her staring at him.

She blushed. “It was a stupid thing to say.”

“No,” he said, “no, that’s fine.”

“It’s silly of me to…” Jean-Janice-Janet said, trailing off. She waved empty fingers in his direction. “Divorced twice. Sometimes I think I should just give up.”

“Oh, I dunno,” said the Doctor thoughtfully. “I waited a long time for Rose.”

He thought about his own wedding ring—he’d never even considered taking it off, not even when he thought Rose was gone. He felt a flash of fury. They’d stolen her wedding ring. They took it and stuck it on that dead body and tricked him into thinking she was gone.

He wondered if she would still want it back after eighty innocent lives.

Something on the computers beeped and he jerked up. “Oh—oh—that’s it! I knew you could do it, you beautiful things.” He kissed the sonic screwdriver before sliding it back in his pocket.

“You’ve found her?” said Jean-Janice-Janet eagerly.

“Locking onto her location now!” said the Doctor, unable to keep the wild joy out of his voice. He jumped to his feet. “Now, Ja—” he stopped and drew out the last syllable, looking at her hopefully.

“Karen?” she supplied.

“Right! KAREN! That's what I thought.” He raked a hand through his hair. “Fancy helping me bring Rose back?”

“Thought you’d never ask,” Karen said.

He took her by the shoulders and led her over to the computers. “Keep an eye on this chart there—as long as the lines stay vertical to each other, we’re alright. But if they start spiking—”

“Reboot the system?” Karen offered. The Doctor raised his eyebrow and she added, “I know a thing or two about how technology works in Torchwood. We’ve been lobbying the government to raise our budget for years, but you know how these things work.”

“It’s all about how you use what you’ve got,” said the Doctor. “Though a little bit of extra help wouldn’t go amiss…” he trailed off, pulling at his hair again. “ALIEN TECH! THAT’S WHAT WE NEED!”

Karen jumped at his outburst, eyes sliding from the computers, to his face and back again. “How do you mean?”

“I’ve got to talk to Pete,” he said. He pointed to the computer. “Keep your eye on it! And don’t let anyone else touch it!”

“Got it!”

“You’re a star,” the Doctor called out before dashing away.

****

The Doctor burst into Pete’s office without knocking and Pete glared at him from where he was on the phone. Without preamble, the Doctor strode over to Pete’s desk, grabbed the phone, and slammed it back into its cradle.

“I know how to rescue Rose,” he announced.

Pete opened his mouth, hesitating like he wasn’t sure whether to berate him for bursting in.

The Doctor decided to take that as permission to continue. “Teleport,” he said. “Lock onto her position and teleport her back to Earth.” He paused and grinned, “We’ll call it ‘Beam me up, Doctor!’”

“Okay…” Pete said slowly, giving the Doctor a look he reserved for when he thought the Doctor sounded particularly insane. “It’s not that I doubt your abilities, but we’re years away from developing teleport technology.”

“Not if we borrow it from someone else.”

Pete looked intrigued. “Go on.”

“I’ve got an old Sontaran teleport,” said the Doctor. “Must have fallen to Earth—ooh, two years back? Short range only, but with a little tinkering—and sheer dumb luck—I might just be able to lock onto Rose’s position.”

Pete’s expression wasn’t the overjoyed look he was expecting. “You have a Sontaran teleport?”

“Yup.”

“And you happened to, what, find it lying around?”

The Doctor shifted. "Depends. Would you buy that?”

Pete crossed his arms over his chest. “Doctor, I’ve taken a lot on faith letting you work with us again—”

“Oh, alright,” snapped the Doctor. “Back when I was sorting out Torchwood’s archives, I confiscated a few items.”

Pete heaved a sigh. “You … of course you did.” He paused. “Why?”

The Doctor rubbed the back of his neck. “Just… just the technology I thought would be too dangerous left in Torchwood’s hands.”

Pete stared at him incredulously. “Technology _you_ thought was too dangerous in _our_ hands?”

The Doctor’s tone hardened. “ _I_ know how to use them properly. You don’t. I thought it was best for everyone.”

“You thought the really dangerous stuff was better left in _your_ hands?!” Pete exploded. He stood up and began pacing, face reddening. He spun around. “Are you _insane_?”

“I’ve had 900 years of experience with alien technology. How much experience does Torchwood have?”

“That doesn’t give you the right to steal from us—not even if you thought it was for the best.” Pete stepped closer to him, lowering his voice. “You’re a dangerous man, Doctor. Even more so without Rose. What if you decided to use that technology? Who could possibly stop you?”

The Doctor swallowed. “I wouldn’t.”

“You might think that now, but if the threat was big enough, if you were furious enough, what stands between you and that technology? What then, Doctor?”

“I wouldn’t,” the Doctor repeated. “Believe me, Pete Tyler, I have seen more death and destruction than you can even conceive of. I don't want to see any more.”

“And how much of it did you cause?”

The Doctor looked away and didn’t answer.

“That’s what I thought,” Pete said quietly. “You can use the teleport to bring Rose back under one condition. You bring back each and every piece of technology you stole from us.”

“And if I refuse?”

“Then no, Doctor,” Pete said, now sounding exhausted. “You can’t build the teleport.”

The Doctor flinched. “If I don’t build it, Rose might be stuck forever. I need Torchwood's laboratory to get it working.”

Pete paled, but his tone was steely. “Yes.”

“You could use her and toss her away without a second thought?”

“Of course not,” Pete spat. “But my first and most important job is serving this country and this planet. I’m sorry, Doctor, I’m very sorry, but I can’t allow that technology to stay in your hands.”

“And you’d sacrifice Rose.”

“If that’s what it takes,” said Pete. “But I don’t think it will come to that. What do you think, Doctor? Are you so desperate to hold your Time Lord superiority over us that you’ll give up Rose?”

“No,” he bit out. Then he added, “I’ve done a lot of things in my life, Pete Tyler, but this is a new low.”

Pete ignored him. “I want every single piece of technology back—every spark plug, every bit. If I think you’re lying, I’ll send a team into your flat. I’ll tear it to the ground. Do you understand?”

“Oh, yes.” The Doctor plastered on a smile. With forced cheer, he said, “Should I leave Rose stranded while I round up your technology or do I have permission to rescue her first?”

“You can start building the teleport.”

“How generous of you,” the Doctor said dryly. “I’m touched by your fatherly concern.” He gave a mock solute. “Nice talking to you, Pete, as always.”  


\--


	5. Chapter 5

  
The Doctor sat in a hard, plastic chair with his elbows resting on his knees. He stared at the Sontaran teleport, which took up an entire corner of Torchwood’s main laboratory. He might have the teleport, but he still wasn’t sure what to do with it.

Karen peered over the Doctor’s shoulder, her fingers curling around the back of his chair. “What is it going to do?” she said in a hushed voice.

There was a hint of trepidation in her tone, but there was curiosity, too. The Doctor turned, taking in her perfectly polished pink fingernails before meeting her gaze. She managed a bright smile and swept dark hair off her shoulder with her other hand. Despite his reputation (or because of it?), Karen seemed genuinely fascinated by him—even as he worked at the Sontaran teleport, alone, in the back corners of Torchwood’s main laboratory.

Karen might have made a good companion, once.

She was also the sort of person that Rose once admitted she hated being around. “You can spot them a million miles away,” she said. “Rich, went to private schools, have got all their A-levels, and graduated from the best university in the country. And they always have perfect hair and nails.”

“You’re rich,” he’d point out.

“I grew up on an Estate!” Rose would reply, looking at him sadly like he hadn’t the faintest idea how classism in Britain worked.

He’d tried convincing her that after fighting aliens and travelling in time, a few rich people with fancy degrees should be no problem. But it wasn’t that, not really. Rose could wear the suits and fit in with the best of them. She could even tailor her accent to make it fit the corporate world. It was about _belonging_ , she said. About who she felt most comfortable around.

“It’s a teleport,” he said gruffly, feeling like this was an important test of his loyalty to Rose. “And do you mind? I could use a bit of space.”

And, if he was honest, he was still furious at Pete and looking for a way to release some of his pent-up frustration.

Karen backed up immediately, sounding hurt. “I just wanted to help.”

He ignored her and returned to fiddling with the teleport. He managed to poke at it with the sonic screwdriver for exactly two seconds before feeling badly.

“Karen, wait—” she turned around, raising her eyebrows expectantly. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”

She looked surprised at his apology and then she folded her arms over her chest, her curiosity evidently returning. “Bad conversation with the boss, I take it?”

Oh, yes, she definitely would have made an effective companion.

“Pete Tyler is not my boss,” said the Doctor, returning his attention to the teleport. “But essentially yes.”

She walked back over to him, her heels clicking over the floor. “What happened?”

He clenched his jaw as he worked on the teleport, feeling his anger and frustration rise again. It wasn’t the first time that someone used Rose against him, but rarely had anyone managed to be so effective. He remembered saying _I believe in her_ with more conviction than he’d ever felt in anything, but this time he couldn’t just turn his back on her and wait for her to find her way home alone.

The worst of it was, Pete wasn’t some monster or alien menace. He was Jackie’s husband and Rose’s father. He was family—and there was nothing the Doctor could do except swallow his pride and do as Pete said.

Instead of answering, the Doctor said, “I could try and build the teleport on my own, of course, but I _need_ Torchwood—it’s the only place in all of London that can even begin to support teleportation technology. Landing here is the only shot Rose has.” He paused, musing aloud, “The problem is, this is a Sontaran teleport designed for Sontaran technology. I can lock onto her position, but it won’t do me any good if she’s stranded on a moon in the middle of nowhere.”

“Well, she sent you a message, right?” said Karen. “That doesn’t exactly suggest a moon in the middle of nowhere.”

The Doctor scratched at his chin. “No,” he said. “It doesn’t.” He glanced at Karen. “You’re very good at this.”

“Thought I might be,” said Karen. “So, come on. Let’s think. You’ve got a teleport and a location. You just... you need to find some way to connect them...”

“Rose,” the Doctor whispered.

Karen blinked. “Sorry?”

“Rose,” the Doctor repeated, louder. “Rose will find a way.” He ran across the room, crouching over where the television from the flat was still plugged into three computers.

Karen followed him at a slower pace. “What will that do?”

“If she could send me a video, there must be someway to—AHA!” he cried as the screen began to sputter and cackle its way to life. He turned around and grinned at Karen. “I send Rose a message using our television and Rose finds a way to make her technology compatible with my technology.” He paused. “Well, the Sontaran technology.”

“And if she can’t?”

“She will,” said the Doctor confidently. “She’s very good.” He powered on the sonic screwdriver and used his free hand to type commands. “If I just jig this... YES, GOT IT!”

The static onscreen faded and was replaced with a clear image of the Torchwood laboratory. The Doctor shifted his position, lining himself up with the webcam in the middle computer. On the telly, his face filled the screen.

“Oh, well done,” said Karen. She leaned in next to him and waved. A Karen on the television screen waved back. “So what now?”

“Now,” said the Doctor. “I record a video and send Rose a message.”

****

Rose slept lightly.

She trusted the Trixans, who had done nothing but assist her since she'd burst onto their ship and done her best to hide herself, but the fact remained that she was any number of light-years away from home and somewhere out there were the people she'd escaped from. She fell asleep in the hopes she wouldn't wake up strapped to a machine like a lab rat again, and even the slightest sound had her jerking awake. It made sleeping in the bottom of a noisy ship rather challenging.

The noise that sent her jerking awake that night was the Doctor's voice.

She sat up abruptly, hitting her head on the metal underside of the bunk above her. Groaning, she rubbed the top of her head and tried to collect her thoughts. Had she been dreaming? Most of her dreams these days featured the Doctor -- the Doctor without her, alone and lost without a TARDIS, or the Doctor finding her, or the Doctor giving up, ignoring her messages and writing her off as a lost cause. On the rare nights she had simple, pleasant dreams, she woke with her arm stretched out across the empty space next to her on the bed.

But no, she thought, this was different. Her dreams had never woken her before, and she was certain she'd heard something. And that _would_ be like him. It wouldn't be the first time the Doctor sent her a message while she slept.

She hoped he had better news for her this time.

"No," the voice carried on -- and it was definitely the Doctor's voice, it was on the PA system, and all at once Rose was completely awake, "not that button, the one beside -- there you go! That'll do it! Hello!"

Rose half-rolled, half-stumbled to her feet and raced down the corridor with a speed she usually reserved for when she was fleeing for her life.

"As I was saying," the Doctor's voice carried on, "if you're hearing this it's because you've got a Rose Tyler on board somewhere and I'd rather like to speak to her. Sorry about that, should only take a few minutes. Hopefully you weren't watching anything too exciting on any of your monitors."

Rose careened around a corner just in time to collide with Celly.

"Rose!" cried Celly, picking herself up off the floor. "I was just looking for--"

"Shh!" Rose shoved herself to her feet and pressed a finger urgently to her lips, desperate not to miss a word of the Doctor's message. He'd done it. He was contacting her. He was contacting her because he knew how to get her home, and she couldn't afford to miss a second of his instructions.

"'Course you might not speak English," the Doctor was saying. "Bit unfortunate if you don't, I suppose, this'll be a long, senseless message." There was a pause. "Nice and private, though."

"He's on the screens," Celly said, blatantly ignoring Rose's second shhh. She grabbed Rose by the hand and tugged her down the hallway. "Come look!"

"Doctor!" said a second voice over the speakers -- female, this time. "The teleport?"

Rose was in the process of identifying the voice -- was it familiar? was she Torchwood? -- when Celly tugged her into a room full of Trixan computers. There on the screen, on every screen, was the Doctor.

With an utterly undignified squeal of delight, Rose leapt towards the nearest monitor.

He looked tired, she thought, the sort of tired he got when he worked too hard on a task for far too long and let his own body's requirements fall to the wayside. She felt a twinge of guilt. How long had it been on Earth? How hard had he worked himself, trying to find her?

"Right," said the Doctor on the screen. "The teleport." In a split second the mirth was gone from his face and he looked utterly serious. "Rose, listen. We've got a Sontaran teleport here, fully functional. Well, I say fully functional. It works. Mostly. If you know what you're doing. And I do."

He grinned at her very briefly before adopting a serious expression again. "We can lock onto your location thanks to the message you sent me -- brilliant, by the way, I hope you don't mind me taking a page out of that book -- but the teleport's not that advanced. I can't fire a signal in your general direction and hope it sticks."

He leaned back from the camera and raked a hand back through his hair, distressed. "Sontarans are constantly at war, so they keep their technological secrets closely guarded and incompatible with the equipment of most other species. Amongst Sontaran technology, though, there’s a common thread – a frequency, to be specific – to ensure that Sontaran tech recognizes other Sontaran tech. Sort of like how Cybus had things set up on this Earth, with every bit of electronics compatible with everything else.”

He rocked on his heels. “For the teleport to work, we need Sontaran technology at the other end. Something, anything, just so it can recognize the frequency and we can pull you back."

As soon as he said “we”, a second head appeared on the screen, just beyond his shoulder. A woman with dark hair waved one manicured hand.

“ _Karen_?” Rose spluttered before she could stop herself.

He smiled apologetically. "That's up to you, though, I'm afraid. The teleport will tell me when it's connected to something at your end, but you'll have to be the one to find it. I'm sorry." The Doctor grinned. "But I'm sure you can handle it. You, Rose Tyler, are incredible." He gave a nod of encouragement, his grin dimming to a sad smile. "I'll see you soon."

Quite abruptly, the screen went black, and then it switched back to scrolling text in the Trixan language. For a second or two Rose stood there, crouched by the screen, feeling bereft now that the Doctor's voice and image were gone. Then she stood, a slow smile creeping across her face.

The Doctor was okay. The Doctor had found her. She was going home. All she had to do was find some Sontaran technology.

Brilliant.

"That was your Doctor, correct?" asked Celly.

Rose nodded, beaming now. "That's him."

Celly looked at the screen where the Doctor had been. “And is he considered attractive, for one of your species?”

Rose’s grin turned rather smug. “I’d say so, yeah.”

Celly tilted her head, seeming to consider this. “…Fascinating,” she said at last.

“Oi, that’s my husband!” Rose swatted her arm and glared, then pulled herself back to the task at hand. “Never mind that.” She took a deep breath and put her hands on her hips, readying herself for some hard work. “So. Sontaran equipment. You got any?”

****

Deep in the bowels of the Trixan ship, there was a storage room full of technological odds and ends.

“We collect them,” Celly explained. “We use the things we have down here help us to make our products compatible with our clients’ equipment.”

Trixan records suggested that they’d never done business with the Sontarans, but Celly had admitted the possibility that there might be some Sontaran material regardless, if Rose was very lucky. Not one to turn up her nose at luck when it had done so much for her before, Rose had insisted on having a look, and so they were rifling through the stockpiles.

They’d been at it for a long time, now, and Rose was rapidly becoming frustrated. It was hard for her to identify any of the machinery on her own when even the labels were in a language she couldn’t read. While her time with the Doctor and working for Torchwood gave her an edge over an average person off the streets of London, there were very few things she could identify on her own without Celly’s help. She recognized a hair dryer and something she thought might have use as a microwave. There was something that looked like a mobile phone and something that looked like a hand-held mirror, and none of it was the least bit Sontaran.

Rose bit back a sigh, shoving the mirror aside roughly and working her way to another shelf.

“We started with that shelf,” Celly said, standing awkwardly in the piles of discarded technology that Rose had scattered on the floor. “I think… I think we’ve looked through everything.”

Rose clenched her jaw and crouched down in the nearest pile, picking through things she knew she’d already looked at. “We might have missed something.”

There was a pause. In the periphery of her vision, she saw Celly shift awkwardly again, switching the mirror to her other hand. “We were… very thorough,” she pointed out.

Rose ignored her. She snatched up a device that was in essence a high-tech alien salad spinner, scowled at it, and set it down beside her. There had to be something. The Doctor had said it could be anything. Surely somewhere in this massive stockroom there was a Sontaran hair clip or something.

“It was a bit of a long shot,” Celly went on, “as we never have done business with the Sontarans, and most of what is in here we pick up from our clients—“

“There’s got to be something.” Rose picked up another gadget, inspecting it in the light.

“That’s Andofalian,” said Celly. “We looked at it earlier, remember? We looked at all of these things, there’s nothing Sontaran—”

“I’m not just giving up,” Rose snapped finally, turning to give Celly a withering stare. “You really don’t understand me at all if you expect me to just throw up my hands and give up. He said I needed Sontaran technology, I’ll find Sontaran technology.”

Celly fidgeted nervously under Rose’s intense gaze. “I’m not saying you should give up forever, but maybe there’s another way—“

“That could be months. It could be years!” Rose could hear her voice getting shriller and struggled to keep a handle on it. “I’m not just waiting around until one of us miraculously comes up with something else, I want to go home!”

An awkward silence settled between them, and Rose busied herself with rooting through more of the gadgets she knew she’d already inspected. Biting her lip and doing her best to hold back a scream of frustration, she ran her fingers along the cool metal object in her hand. It was one of the few items she hadn’t needed Celly’s assistance in identifying, because it looked remarkably like the gun Jack had always carried, unbeknownst to the Doctor. She remembered him showing her once, while the Doctor toiled away beneath the console.

"Small and compact," Jack had praised it, "easy to hide." When she'd asked where exactly he intended to hide it, he'd only given her that trademark Harkness grin that suggested she was better off not knowing. She’d been fascinated even as she knew she ought to disapprove, and she’d agreed to keep his secret so long as he agreed never to use it.

She missed Jack Harkness, she thought. It was weird, remembering the time when she’d been travelling with her first Doctor and Jack. It felt like lifetimes ago.

Rose sighed, checking that the safety was on before setting the gun to the side. There had to be something she could use, somewhere in this room. Though it had heartened her at first, now the memory of the Doctor’s image on the screen seemed to haunt her. He had so much faith in her. How long would he wait for her to find something? She could picture him at Torchwood, watching the monitors intently, refusing to eat or sleep until he heard from her. What if it took her days, weeks, months to work something out? What if she never did?

She swallowed thickly, setting the blaster aside and wiping her eyes. There had to be something. There had to be.

She cleared her throat, hoping she didn’t sound as choked up as she felt. “You can go,” she told Celly quietly, still staring at her hands. “I know you’ve got work to do, I can keep looking on my own.”

Celly opened her mouth, but something caught Rose’s eye. “Wait!” she said, making a beeline for the hand-held mirror again. She picked it up between both her hands and looked down at it. It was coated in dust and grime and its edges were rusted, but her pinched and worried face stared back at her. “What if,” she said slowly, raising her head to meet Celly’s gaze, “we bounce the signal back to him? Trick the teleport into thinking we’ve got Sontaran technology on our end?”"

Celly considered this. “That might work. We’ll have to reconfigure the matrix of our computers, but—”

Before Celly could finish, a loud booming noise from overhead cut her off. Rose had just enough time to marvel that it sounded like a firework going off before the entire ship pitched violently to the left, sending Celly stumbling into the wall and tossing Rose back against a pile of gadgets. A siren began to wail, and from far away, she could hear a raising chattering of Trixan voices.

Rose quickly found her feet as adrenaline hit her bloodstream. She hastily tucked the mirror into her side, feeling like she had to protect her one chance of getting home at all costs. She stepped gingerly over the rubbish and helped Celly to her feet. “What the hell was that?”

Celly shook her head. “I don’t know—”

Before she could answer, a second Trixan—yellow, this time—bounded into the room, looking panicked. “We’re under attack,” she said hurriedly. “Single passenger ship, looks like, but it’s well armed.” She hesitated, looking guiltily at Rose. “He’s a bounty hunter. He… he want us to hand you over or he’ll keep firing.”

Rose felt nauseous. “He’s bluffing,” she said, shaking her head. “They need me alive. If he keeps firing, he’ll kill me.” She swallowed, determined to ignore her growing sensation of panic. “Single passenger ship, though, can’t be that big. Can’t we take him down?”

The Trixans exchanged perplexed glances, and then Celly turned back to Rose. “This ship’s not armed. We don’t carry weapons,” Celly explained, shaking her head. “We don’t… fight.”

For a second Rose stared at them, wondering why on Earth they seemed to think now was a good time to experiment with sarcasm. “You’re serious,” she said slowly.

The Trixans nodded.

“You don’t have weapons,” Rose repeated, aware that she was starting to sound incredulous. “You don’t have weapons because you don’t fight.” She shook her head, letting out a laugh that was just a little panicky. “Well, the Doctor would love you.” She set her shoulders. “Right. Well. Better let him onboard, then.”

The Trixans exchanged worried glances.

“You… want us to surrender you?” Celly asked, sounding horrified.

Rose shook her head. She walked back to where she had been sitting and crouched down, fishing Jack’s blaster out of the heap. She clicked the safety off and then looked at them, steely determination in her voice. “I have no intention of surrendering.”

****

The man who had come for her looked almost human.

She wondered what strange evolutionary fluke made that basic structure so common across the universe. It reminded Rose distinctly of bad sci-fi films that played late at night on obscure television channels, ones with budgets so low they could only seem to afford face paint and perhaps some shiny spandex clothes. He was bigger than most humans she knew, probably close to seven feet, and after spending weeks in the company of Trixans he seemed enormous. His most differentiating feature, though, was his waxy white-gray skin and the fact that Rose could see nothing of his eyes but the pupils.

He looked creepy even to Rose and she'd seen her fair share of aliens.

It probably didn’t help that he was holding a gun that seemed to be roughly the size of Rose’s torso. She stepped towards him slowly with her palms raised, well-aware that the look of fear on her face was not entirely insincere.

“I’ll go with you if you promise not to hurt them,” she said earnestly, gesturing with her head towards the Trixans who had gathered round, standing fearfully at the edges of the room. “They’re harmless, their ship’s not even armed.”

He regarded her calmly and coldly, shaking his head. “Pacifists. I have no interest in them.” He tilted his head to look at her and grinned. “You, on the other hand, seem to be very valuable.”

Rose smirked. “I bet you say that to all the girls.”

He ignored her and stepped forward, grabbing her upper arm roughly and twisting her around in front of him. His fingers were strong and his hands were nearly large enough to close all the way around her arm. She’d have a bruise there, she thought. The muzzle of his oversized gun dug into the small of her back.

She wondered what the Doctor would think, if he could see what she was about to do.

“Hands behind your head,” he hissed, and Rose complied.

She let him march her two steps towards the transmat before she spoke. “They killed my friends,” she said matter-of-factly, a calm tone that belied her rage – one she’d learned from the Doctor. “People I worked with, they killed them all, just to get to me. They took me from my family, dragged me halfway across the universe. And d’you know what I learned?”

“Shut up, will you?” He gripped her arm tighter and twisted the gun into her back. “Do you have any idea how hard it was to track you down? Weeks, it’s been. ‘Course, the barrage of incoming calls helped. Signals pouring into this place.” He shoved her forward another step. “You’ve made me rich, sweetheart, but you’re one hell of a pain in the ass.”

Rose swallowed, still taking the smallest steps she could. “I learned,” she went on, “that it’s a really bad idea to hold someone at gunpoint when they know you need them alive.” Before he could respond, she reached her free hand into her shirt and pulled out her own gun.

With the precision she’d learned at Torchwood, she landed a single shot between his eyes.

The body collapsed to the floor with a sickening thud, and most of the Trixans screamed. Rose lowered her gun and clicked on the safety, feeling light-headed. It was by no means the first time she’d killed in self-defense. Working for Torchwood, she’d come to accept that it was sometimes a necessity. That didn’t mean she liked it.

She’d argued the point with the Doctor before, worried that his own rigid moral code would get him killed, simply because he refused to arm himself. She’d admired that commitment and idealism as a teenager, but now it scared her. Sometimes she wondered if he truly understood that he was mortal now.

Still, the thought that he would disapprove upset her. She shivered, and after one last look at the body, she lifted her head to face the Trixans.

“Sorry,” she said, to nothing in particular. She took a deep breath and gave herself a shake, then forced a grim smile onto her face. “So I suppose we ought to get me off your ship before I cause even more trouble, then, yeah?”

****

Rose leaned over Celly’s shoulder, wishing for the thousandth time that she could read Trixan and actually do something useful.

“I think we may be able to reflect it like you said,” Celly had explained, hooking the mirror up to one of their computers, “You know, trick the teleport into thinking there’s Sontaran technology on the other end. That’s sort of how we sent your Doctor a message in the first place.” She’d shrugged. “It might not work, but it’s worth a shot.”

And so Celly had gone to work, fiddling with the Trixan computers in ways Rose could never possibly manage. As it was, she was stuck lurking in the background, able to do little more than follow Celly’s instructions. It reminded her uncomfortably of her early days in the TARDIS, fretting that she’d do or say the wrong thing and the mad man in leather would toss the back to the estate.

“Almost done,” Celly announced, leaning forward over her computer screen. “Just need to… there we go!” She grinned up at Rose. “Signal sent. It’ll take a moment to get back to your planet, but once it does this will notify me—“ she pointed at her screen “—and if you stand over there—” she pointed across the room “—the signal should be able to pick you up.”

Rose looked in the direction Celly was pointing, a giddy excitement bubbling in her stomach. Home. She was going home. “That’s… that’s brilliant,” she said, beaming. Without warning she turned and launched herself at Celly, crushing her in a hug. “Thank you! Thank you so much!”

Celly stayed frozen on her chair, evidently unsure of how to react to this bizarre human show of affection. “You’re very welcome. Perhaps we’ll pass by Earth some day. …If we can find it.”

Rose stopped grinning ear-to-ear long enough to pull back and look at Celly earnestly. "I mean it. Really." She swallowed, suddenly feeling terribly guilty for all she'd used the Trixans for. "I know I've been a burden, and there's damage to your ship, and there's not much I can do to repay you..." She shook her head and frowned. "You won't be in trouble because of me, will you? I mean, this won't happen again once I'm gone, will it?"

Celly shook her head. "Oh, I shouldn't think so." Her ears gave a mirthful twitch. "We'll be receiving considerably fewer intergalactic calls, for one."

Something on the computer next to them beeped, and Celly pulled away.

“That’s it,” she said. “Head over there and I’ll set it off.”

Rose pulled away and nodded, again smiling so wide her cheeks hurt. “Thanks again,” she said earnestly. She stepped to where Celly had instructed and gave her one last look, grinning. “And you know, if you’re ever interested in a free trade agreement…”

****

One second Rose was standing on a Trixan ship, bidding farewell to her friend, and the next second she was standing in a Sontaran teleport in the corner of Torchwood’s largest lab. The lab was filled with people, and for a moment all of them were silent as Rose stepped out of the teleport.

Then they burst into a round of applause.

Overwhelmed with relief and giddiness, Rose could think of nothing to do but smile and wave. Almost automatically she found herself scanning the room for the Doctor. He had to be here somewhere, hidden in the crowd of Torchwood employees, if she could just find him—

Her search was interrupted by a loud sob and a body colliding with hers.

“ _Rose!_ ” Jackie Tyler nearly knocked her daughter off her feet with the sheer enthusiasm in her hug. With a kiss to Rose’s forehead, Jackie squeezed her daughter tighter and rocked side to side. “Oh, sweetheart, you’re alive! Are you all right? You’re—you’re—I thought—” She broke off, sobbing into Rose’s shoulder.

Rose swallowed around the brand-new lump in her throat and squeezed her mum in return, feeling undeniably guilty. How many times had she put her mum through this, now? “It’s okay, Mum,” she said, with a watery laugh and smile. “I’m okay. I’m sorry.”

Jackie pulled back, taking Rose’s face in both her hands. “You’re gonna kill me,” she said, shaking her head even as she smiled. “This job of yours, the trouble you get into, it’s gonna kill me.”

“I’m sorry,” Rose repeated earnestly. She blinked back the moisture in her eyes, smiling again. “Home now, though, yeah?”

Jackie smiled back, wiping her eyes with one hand. “Yeah.” She drew Rose in for another short but tight hug, then stepped back, sniffing. “Suppose I should let some other people say hello, too. Tony’s not here, it’s past his bedtime, but…”

Jackie trailed off, taking another step back, and Rose looked around the room again, searching for the Doctor.

Instead, she found Pete Tyler.

“Rose,” he said, giving her a nod and a fond smile. “Welcome back.”

“Yeah. S’good to be back.” For a moment Rose stood where she was, hesitating. As best she could tell, this Pete Tyler was not an overly affectionate man. Whether that was simply how he was or whether it had something to do with her being the daughter of another man, Rose had never quite figured out.

But Pete stepped forward and held out his arms, and with a delighted grin Rose closed the hug.

“Good to have you back,” Pete countered. He patted her twice on the back and then released her, still regarding her warmly. Rose nodded, a warm, comfortable feeling spreading through her chest. She took a step back, tucking her arms in front of her and looked around again.

Finally, she found the Doctor.

He was standing off to the side of the lab, next to a computer that was wired to a television. He looked exhausted, as he had in the video, but completely alert. He was watching her intently, and the second she caught his eye he gave her the slightest of smiles.

Rose bit her bottom lip, trying to blink away the sudden blurring in her vision. “Hi,” she said eventually.

The Doctor gave the smallest of nods. “Hello.”

For a second or two, they stayed where they were, and Rose held her breath.

And then suddenly they both moved at once, closing the space between them with a sprint. Rose launched herself at the Doctor, looping her legs around his waist; the Doctor spun her in a full circle, clutching her so tightly it was almost painful. She pulled her head back until it was at just the right angle and kissed him, urgent and frantic and eager, her hands latched on to his shoulders. He kissed her back desperately, like at any second she might disappear, hands fisted in her shirt.

God, she’d missed him.

Eventually becoming aware that she was snogging the Doctor in front of dozens of family and coworkers, Rose lowered her feet to the floor and pulled away, though she kept her arms around his shoulders. The Doctor opened his eyes, smiling deliriously, still holding her as tightly as he possibly could.

“Think we finally got that right,” said Rose. “No Daleks in the way this time.”

“No Daleks,” the Doctor agreed.

There was a quiet cough, and they both turned in time to see Karen ushering people out of the room. Most people were quick to comply, except for Jackie, who seemed reluctant to let Rose out of her sight and had to be steered from the room by Pete. Karen looked back over her shoulder and winked, and the Doctor laughed.

When the door to the lab was shut, Rose turned back to the Doctor, one eyebrow raised. “You made friends.”

“I made _a_ friend,” the Doctor corrected. “Singular.” He sniffed and glanced towards the door. “Karen’s quite nice! Although her taste in men is a bit dubious.”

“Really? I always thought she fancied you,” Rose admitted, tracing her fingers along his collar. Then she wrapped her arms around his shoulders again, burying her face in the crook of his neck. “Missed you,” she mumbled.

“Yeah,” he said, his voice oddly quiet. She felt him swallow and press a kiss to her hair. “Missed you too.”

Rose bit her lip, settling against his chest and enjoying the comforting rhythm of his pulse. “Sontaran teleport! Easy. They’ll have to try harder than that to keep us apart.”

“Don’t.” The Doctor’s voice was sharp, and she looked up to see him shaking his head. “Don’t say that, just… don’t.”

 _Never say never ever_ , Rose thought. She frowned, taking in the frantic look on his face and wondering how long it had been since he’d slept. “I’d’ve got back on my own,” she said, resolved. “Next to a dimensional cannon, hitch-hiking a few billion light-years is nothing.” She bumped him with her shoulder. “Not that I don’t appreciate the help.”

The Doctor smiled weakly in return, not meeting her eyes. She opened her mouth to say something, but the Doctor beat her to it. “What happened? Who took you? What did they want with you?”

Rose rolled her shoulders, none too eager to discuss the first few weeks she’d spent away from home. “They were… they were just looking for profit, I think.” She shrugged again, fiddling with the buttons of his suit jacket. “They killed my team. Woke up strapped to all sorts of machines. Turns out they wanted me for the Void stuff. They can use it as a power source and hey, free supply.” She quirked an eyebrow and pursed her lips. “Guess when I did all that traveling trying to find you I turned into a Void stuff buffet.”

She glanced up at the Doctor, not surprised to find his expression had turned hard and cold – and, if she was honest, a little bit frightening. “They were using you as a battery,” he bit out, staring furiously at the wall overtop of her head.

Rose nodded, reaching up to rest one hand at the back of his neck. “But not for long. I got away. They stopped at this sort of… docking bay, and I got away. Snuck onto another ship, made some friends.”

But the Doctor didn’t seem to hear that part. “They were using you as a _battery_ ,” he repeated, his voice wavering with barely-contained rage. “They killed your friends and they kidnapped you and they used you as a power source and then they stole your wedding ring and—” He cut himself off abruptly, releasing a long, shuddering breath. Rose was fairly certain the wall behind her was about to crumble under his stare.

“My ring.” She looked down at her empty left hand, running her thumb along the groove where her ring had been. “Why did they take my ring?”

The Doctor looked down at her, his fury softening to worry and concern. “They…” He trailed off, hesitating in that way he always did when he had to be the bearer of bad news to her.

So Rose widened her eyes in that way she always did when she wanted him to tell her something.

He sighed. “They used it to fake your death, Rose.”

Whatever Rose had been expecting, it wasn’t that. “What? Fake my death? D’you mean…?” She shrugged, unable to finish that sentence.

“There was a body,” he said quietly, avoiding her eyes again. “Wearing your ring. Looked like you. We thought… I thought…” He closed his eyes, giving his head a sharp shake. “I should’ve known better. I’m sorry.”

Rose was silent, reeling from the implications and a sudden surge of fury. They’d faked her death. As though her disappearance wouldn’t be hard enough on her family, they’d left behind a body? Had there been a funeral and everything? “How long?”

The Doctor kept his head turned from her, his eyes downcast. “Almost two months, now. I realized, of course, once I got your message, but I—I didn’t… I thought…” He swallowed hard and finally met her eyes again. “I love you,” he told her seriously.

With the hand at the back of his neck, Rose pulled him down for a lingering kiss. “Love you too,” she said afterwards. She pressed a second quick kiss to his lips and then hugged him properly again, one hand rubbing up and down his back and shoulders, a futile attempt at relieving the tension she felt there.

The Doctor kept his arms around her waist and bent down to hide his face in her hair.

For a long while they stood like that, neither saying a word; then, finally, the Doctor slackened his grip on Rose and she stepped back, taking his hand.

“Come on,” she said gently. She rubbed her thumb over his, grateful for the familiar contact. “I’d better spend a few hours with Mum before we leave here.” She paused, and then grinned wickedly. “Then we can head home and you can show me how much you really missed me.”

The Doctor stared at her, a slow smile spreading across his face. “Yes ma’am.”  



	6. Chapter 6

  
As the door to their flat closed behind them, Rose’s smile faded as she got a good look at the living room. The flat looked... empty. The television was gone from the wall, leaving a mess of cables and dust in its wake. There were holes in the bookshelf like someone had come along and pulled books off the shelf at random. Pictures that had once sat on the mantel were nowhere to be found.

She took another step forward and then stopped, frowning. She sniffed the air. Was that whiskey?

She turned back to the Doctor and almost asked ‘Have we been robbed?’ before she got a good look at his expression. Her heart sank.

He’d thought she was dead.

Even now it sunk in little bits at a time. He’d spent months thinking she was dead. It was pure luck, really, that he’d seen her message, that he’d figured it out. If not, she might never have... and he might have...

“I packed your stuff,” he said abruptly. He shoved his hands in his pockets and looked away. “There wasn’t time to... I’m sorry.”

 _Moved on_ , she finished to herself quietly. But there was something aching and ancient about his eyes and she felt guilty for even thinking it.

“It’s all right,” she said hurriedly. She reached for his hand and squeezed his fingers. “It’s just stuff, Doctor. All that matters is that we’re together, yeah?”

He opened his mouth, hesitating for a second like he might tell her something, before he hastily shut it. “Yeah,” he finally said. The agonized look in his eyes seemed to melt away and he smiled tenderly. “Except...”

Without finishing, he released her hand and dashed off towards the bedroom. _About time_ , Rose thought as she followed him.

“What is it?” she said with a teasing smile, turning the corner.

The Doctor was bent over the nightstand, “Aha!” he said, turning around proudly. Rose took a step closer, and then grinned.

“My wedding ring,” she said. “You kept it.”

The Doctor’s eyes looked suspiciously wet. “Of course I did,” he said softly. He held it up between his fingers. “Come on.”

She closed the distance between them, beginning to feel choked up herself. She held out her finger, but the Doctor suddenly paused, again looking like he wanted to tell her something. “Doctor? What is it?”

He swallowed, but then said, “Nothing.” He slid the ring onto her finger with trembling hands, and Rose’s heart skipped a beat. It felt right having the ring back on—a reminder that she was really home.

The same thought seemed to be going through the Doctor’s mind. He reached out and stroked her hair before pressing his forehead to hers. “I love you,” he said quietly.

“I love you, too,” Rose said.

He kissed her then, his kiss full of a desperation she’d never felt from him. Things had been intense between them before, of course—after Bad Wolf Bay (the second time) and when they both survived a close shave at the office.

But it had never really felt like this.

Some of the Doctor’s desperation seemed to bleed through to her and she found herself meeting his frantic kisses, her hands tugging inelegantly at his clothes.

***

A while later, Rose lay spooned in the Doctor’s arms, naked and warm and fully content. Had she only said goodbye to Celly that morning? It felt like ages ago. She felt a surge of gratitude for her alien friend—if it hadn’t been for Celly, she never would have made it home.

“Rose,” said the Doctor, in a tone of voice that told her he’d been pondering something for a while, “tell me about what happened to you?”

Rose turned to bury half her face in the pillow. “I did.”

She felt the press of his fingers on her arm, gently tracing the bruises the bounty hunter on the Trixan ship had left behind. “Not the whole story,” he said darkly. “Rose, please?”

She breathed into her pillow, feeling hot pinpricks of tears in her eyes. She swallowed hard, forcing them back. No, she wouldn’t cry. She was home now. It was done.

She turned around in his arms and stared at the ceiling, looking anywhere but at his face. “There was never gonna be a free trade agreement. They didn’t care about Great Britain—or planet Earth for that matter. They were after me the whole time.”

“They wanted to profit.”

“Yeah,” Rose said. “At least—I think so. I was really out of it at first. They had me on a whole cocktail of mood enhancers.”

“They drugged you,” the Doctor said quietly, and the anger in his voice chilled her.

“They didn’t seem to know much about humans, though, ‘cos it wore off,” Rose said. “Course, that’s when...”

“It started to hurt,” he finished.

She nodded, not trusting herself to speak. He hugged her tightly, and Rose pressed her face against his shoulder. She’d been doing her best not to think about those disorienting moments after she woke up, alone, wires cutting into her arms and making her feel like her skin was on fire. Instead she had focused her attention on escaping and finding her way home.

“I’m so sorry,” he whispered into her hair. “I should have stopped it. Them.”

“Wasn’t your fault,” she mumbled, eyes burning. “I wouldn’t even let you come with me, remember? I thought it was about fish and chips--the international relations of the future.”

He smiled faintly. Rose tried to smile back, but it was a losing battle and a tear slipped down her cheek. The Doctor hurriedly gathered her up closely, sitting up to lean against the headboard. He rocked her silently as she began to cry against his shoulder.

Rose took a few gasping breaths in a vain attempt to get herself back under control. It was funny, all that time that she had been fighting her way back she had never broken down—not like this. But now that she was home and safe, it was like all her bottled up anguish and fear was demanding to be released.

Finally, her tears tapered off and the Doctor rubbed her back in small circles. “But you got away,” he said, breaking the silence. “Rose, do you have any idea how amazing you are?”

She laughed, and it sounded like a high-pitched whine. “I guess I got lucky.” She paused. “After the drugs wore off, I knew what was happening. I could fight back. And they didn’t want anything happening to me.”

“No,” said the Doctor bitterly. “Not to their free power supply.”

“They’re still out there.” She paused before adding, “They sent someone after me.”

The Doctor’s hands stilled on her back. “The bruises?”

“Present from a bounty hunter,” Rose confirmed. She looked away and in a softer voice added, “I killed him.”

The Doctor’s arms instinctively tightened around her and then he released a sharp breath, “Rose—”

“I had to,” she interrupted. “He’d’ve taken me back to them. But I… I picked up a gun and I shot him, right there in front of me.”

“Rose,” he repeated, placing one hand on her cheek and turning her head around to look at him. He hesitated and then said, “I’m sorry.”

She saw a tinge of regret in his eyes, the one he got when he worried she’d become too much like him or that he’d changed her for the worse. It wasn’t that he blamed her for killing him, she knew. It was that he didn’t want her to have to live with it.

She fought the urge to cry again. “For all I know, they’re still out there,” she continued. “They could still send someone else after me.”

“They won’t get far,” said the Doctor. Rose felt a cold chill again—even though he had his arms around her, it felt like he was a million miles away. “I won’t let them.”

“Doctor,” she said quietly, though she wasn’t quite sure how to finish. She wasn’t sure now was the right time to admonish him for doing his best caveman impression.

“You’re not the only one who…” he began before trailing off. “I sent them a message after they took you.”

“How do you mean?”

“I killed them,” he said. He dragged his gaze up to hers. “The ones who stayed behind on Earth. They won’t come back here.”

She felt pinned in place from the intensity of his gaze. She didn’t know what to say—she wasn’t exactly _sorry_ they were gone, but it broke her heart to think of the Doctor getting so vengeful on her behalf. _He thought I was dead_ , she thought. It was so easy for her to forget. All that time she was gone—and he thought she was dead.

“Rose, that’s not all….” He hesitated and his eyes deepened with a look she hadn’t seen in years, not since he took her to see her planet burn and then told her he was the only one left.

Her mouth felt dry, like someone had stuffed it full of cotton. “What is it?”

His eyes swept over her and then he cradled her face, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “Nothing,” he whispered. Then he smiled, and the sadness seemed to melt away. “Rose Tyler, do you have any idea how much I’ve missed you?”

“I think I’ve got a pretty good idea,” she said, smiling back. Without another word, she pressed her lips to his. He kissed her back with that same sort of greedy desperation that he’d shown earlier and Rose wrapped her arms around his neck, leaning into him.

Then she pulled away, wiping at her eyes. “I look disgusting.” She rubbed at her nose with the back of her hand. “I _feel_ disgusting.”

He grabbed her hand. “You look perfect.”

“You’re so full of it,” she said with a laugh. She pulled back the covers. “I’m getting a tissue.”

He clutched at her hand. “Rose?”

“Yeah?”

He smiled faintly. “Just… don’t go anywhere.”

“I won’t,” she said. She squeezed his hand and then released it. “I promise.”

***

Jackie Tyler brought Tony by the next afternoon. She’d had the foresight to call ahead, but the Doctor still felt a touch of resentment. He knew they couldn’t spend the rest of their lives in bed, but a part of him felt like Rose might disappear as soon as he let go of her.

Tony clung to Rose tightly, seeming to easily accept her return. The Doctor almost felt jealous of him—Tony was young enough that he didn’t have a full understanding of the finality of death. In his mind, Rose’s return was natural—after all, how could a person truly be gone forever?

“Mum cried a lot,” Tony said, the side of his face pressed against Rose’s stomach. “It was horrible.”

Rose looked over at Jackie uncomfortably, and then patted Tony on the head. “I’m back now,” she said. She crouched down, her hands on Tony’s shoulders. “And I’m not going anywhere for a good long time, yeah?”

They hugged again, and then Tony launched into a story for Rose about the brand new computer Jackie had bought him and its impressive hard-drive. Rose followed the story intently and nodded in all the right places, her hands still firm on Tony’s shoulders.

She didn’t really understand it, the Doctor thought. She didn’t know—couldn’t know—how profoundly her death had affected them. Oh, she could grasp the enormity of it on an intellectual level, but she could only feel the ripples of its aftershocks. She couldn’t know how it had felt to stand at the front of a church and recite her eulogy.

Jackie came up behind him, eyes on both her children. “Never thought I’d see this again,” she said quietly.

He forced himself to nod, once again experiencing the odd feeling that Jackie Tyler was the only person in the world who knew exactly what he was thinking.

She turned and looked at him, her eyes narrowed and scrutinizing. “And how are you, then?”

The Doctor looked at her in surprise. “Me?”

Before he could stammer out a response, Jackie inclined her head in Rose’s direction and carried on, her voice low. “Twice now, this has happened. I know what it’s like. They come back, but it’s not a magic fix.”

The Doctor shifted uncomfortably. “Jackie—“

“Feels like a dream, at first,” she carried on, evidently oblivious to his objections. “You think they’ll disappear if you close your eyes.” She shrugged and turned to her children again, looking far away. “And even when they don’t, you never forget what it was like when they were gone.”

The ever-familiar feeling of guilt squirmed in his stomach. He’d put Jackie through that hell once, for an entire year. Not intentionally, of course—but he had, and then just when she’d got her daughter back he’d whisked Rose away again. Was he always that selfish?

“Jackie, I’m fine,” he said resolutely. “Better than fine. Fantastic. Brilliant. _Molto bene_!” And then, before Jackie could carry on, he clapped his hands together, earning the attention of Tony and Rose. “So,” he said with forced cheer. “Who’s up for a game of snakes and ladders?”

Tony stared at him like he was a spot of grime on his shoe. Fair enough, the Doctor decided. Snakes and ladders wasn’t likely that exciting to a nine-year-old who spent the majority of his free time playing adrenaline pumping computer games.

He thought for a moment and then dug out the sonic screwdriver, twirling it once in his hand. “The sonic version?” he tried.

Rose looked amused, which was a good sign, and Tony’s eyes widened with intrigue. “What’s the sonic version?” he breathed.

Before he could answer, Jackie cut in with, “Cuppa tea, that’s what we need. Rose, sweetheart, you’ll come help me in the kitchen?”

Rose looked disappointed—like she was quite eager to try out the sonic version of snakes and ladders. But the Doctor inclined his head towards Jackie, silently trying to convey that she should go spend some time with her mother.

“Sure, Mum,” Rose said, mustering a smile. “I think I saw some in a cupboard this morning...”

Once they were gone, the Doctor dug around under the sofa before finally pulling out an old and battered game of snakes and ladders. Tony lurked by the coffee table, wide-eyed and fascinated, clearly ready to reinstate the Doctor to his previous position as Coolest Grown-Up Ever. For the first time, the Doctor found he was uncomfortable with being the object of Tony’s admiration.

“What are you going to do?” Tony asked.

“Well,” began the Doctor as he pulled out the game and brushed the dust from the box. “I am going to give you the illusion that the snakes are alive. It’s more a trick of light than anything else, but...”

He pressed the sonic screwdriver against one of the snakes, and it gave a little slither, its tongue flicking out. Tony jumped and leaned back, his mouth opening slightly.

“How does it work?” asked Tony.

The Doctor blinked, taken aback. “It’s… complicated.”

Tony leaned over the board, eyes wide. “Cool,” he finally said.

While Tony busied himself with fetching the dice and playing pieces from the box, the Doctor looked over his shoulder toward the kitchen. He watched as Rose pulled down four mugs and Jackie rifled through the cupboard.

Finally, Jackie picked out a box of tea and then directed her attention towards Rose. “How are you, sweetheart? Really.”

“I’m all right,” said Rose. Then she sighed. “It’s just... it’s weird. I mean, you all look at me like... like...”

“You _died_ ,” Jackie said, in a high-pitched nasally tone of voice the Doctor often associated with getting slapped. “Rose, there was a body and everything! We had a _funeral_.”

Rose looked a little shocked, but then said, “I’m sorry, Mum. I’m _so_ sorry.”

Jackie dabbed at her eyes with a paper towel. “I know it wasn’t your fault, it’s just....” She forced a smile. “Look at you, though, you came back to us.”

The Doctor swallowed heavily and turned back around. He knew he shouldn’t listen in, but his hearing was still much better than an average human’s. It would have taken a concentrated effort _not_ to hear it.

“Doctor?” Tony said loudly.

The Doctor blinked. “Yes! Sorry! Snakes and ladders, hmm? You roll first, Tony.”

Tony looked slightly suspicious, but took his turn regardless, moving his piece extra quickly to avoid the hissing snakes. The Doctor tuned back into the conversation in the kitchen.

“Look at how skinny you are,” Jackie fussed. “Both of you—fading away to nothing.”

“Mum—”

“You’ll have to start coming by for dinner again,” said Jackie briskly. “I tried to get the Doctor to come by while you were gone, but...” Jackie trailed off and then sighed. “He had such a hard time, Rose.”

“Yeah, I know,” said Rose, sounding defensive. There was a pause and then she added, “It’s different now, though, Mum. _He’s_ different. I don’t know what to do for him.”

“Things will sort themselves out, sweetheart. They always have before.”

Tony poked the Doctor in the arm and he snapped to attention, trying to ignore the sudden burning in his eyes. “My turn, is it?” he said. He rolled the dice and got a three; he hit a ladder and his piece climbed up two rows, much to Tony’s displeasure.

Tony screwed up his eyebrows, concentrating on the board like it contained all the secrets to the universe. The Doctor bit the inside of his lip to keep from frowning. He didn’t want to worry Rose. Was he really so transparent?

“Mum,” Rose continued in the kitchen, “it feels like he’s hiding something. I keep thinking that something awful must have happened.”

“You were gone for two months, sweetheart. How would you feel if that had been the Doctor?”

“I’d have been a wreck,” Rose admitted. But then she added, “Mum, what if I’m not enough for him this time? What if I can’t... fix this?”

The Doctor felt a heavy twist of guilt. Now trying desperately to ignore the conversation in the kitchen, he rolled the die. He moved quickly before saying, “Your move.”

Tony grunted in response, eyes furrowing as he calculated his chances of making it to the next ladder before being eaten.

There was silence from the kitchen and the Doctor glanced over. Jackie was hugging Rose tightly, both of them doing their best to hold back tears. Then the kettle whistled and they pulled away. Rose wiped hastily at her cheeks, picking up the mugs.

“Your father says he wants to talk to you,” said Jackie. “He’ll be working from home tomorrow.”

“I suppose I can pop in,” said Rose. “He didn’t want to come by today?”

“Said it was private,” said Jackie, with a shrug. “Urgent Torchwood business.”

The Doctor’s heart sank. He had a few good guesses as to what Pete wanted to talk to Rose about.

They picked up the mugs and the Doctor averted his gaze back to the game, trying to look like he’d been absorbed the whole time. When Rose touched him on the shoulder, he turned to look at her, smiling warmly. She smiled back and held out a mug of tea.

“Two sugars, no milk,” she said. “Just the way you like it.”

“Excellent,” he said. Then he shifted over, patting the spot next to him. “How do you feel about joining me on an exciting safari through backyard ladders as we hurry to avoid being licked by cardboard snakes?”

“I feel pretty good about it,” Rose said, settling down next to him.

He took a sip of tea (it _was_ just the way he liked it) and resolved to make things better between them. It wasn’t fair to Rose that he had been so distant, and after all she’d been through, the last thing he wanted her to have to worry about was how _he’d_ been.

Suddenly feeling cold, he looped his arm around her shoulders and tugged her closer. If, after talking to Pete and learning what he’d done... if she left...

Well, he certainly wouldn’t blame her.

***

The Doctor made her brunch the next morning.

He cooked quietly; the only noise in the kitchen was the sizzling of the eggs. Rose hunched over the Sunday morning newspaper, trying to ignore the awkward silence between them.

Last night, after Tony and Mum left, she’d almost thought things were getting better. They’d started unpacking her things, getting about halfway through her wardrobe before ending back in bed together. The sex had been more like she remembered it—with both of them laughing and teasing each other instead of the desperate clinging of her first night back.

Now she was beginning to think he’d been putting it on for her sake.

Rose chanced a glance in his direction. The toast popped up, but the Doctor had no reaction. He stared intently into the eggs, prodding them slightly with a spatula, his gaze far away.

Not for the first time, she wished she knew what was going on in his head. Her heart gave a slow ache. Two months was a long time—anything could have happened while she was gone.

“Doctor?”

He snapped to attention, spatula jumping slightly in his hand before he recovered. “Right, sorry,” he mumbled. He hastily spooned the eggs and toast onto two plates before sitting down at the table, setting the plate down in front of her.

“Thanks,” said Rose. She smiled at him. “I’m starved.”

His eyes softened at her smile. “No problemo,” he said. He paused and then something seemed to occur to him, “They _did_ feed you, right?”

“Yeah,” said Rose, digging into her eggs with gusto. “Mostly through a tube at first, but I got real food again after I escaped. The Trixans were into all that organic stuff—lots of sticks and moss and things, sometimes pasta. They were sort of... foragers. Peaceful. I reckon you would have liked them.” She thought for a moment. “Maybe I’ll see them again one day. I hope so, anyway.”

The Doctor grunted in reply and Rose found herself wondering if he’d even heard her. It was like... like he was just going through the motions of being with her, and she hated feeling like there was nothing she could do to help him.

“What does Pete want to talk to you about?” he said abruptly.

Rose blinked, forkful of egg hovering in front of her mouth. He was suddenly watching her intently. “I dunno,” said Rose. “He just said that it was urgent—that’s all. There’s probably paperwork or something that needs to be filled out now that I’m back among the living again.” She chewed and swallowed the mouthful of egg. “You were eavesdropping yesterday, weren’t you? When Mum and I were talking?”

The Doctor shrugged. “Time Lord hearing,” he said as a non-explanation. “Rose—” he began, “you _do_ know how happy I am to have you back, don’t you?”

Rose looked away and idly pushed the egg around on her plate. “Yeah.”

“It was... difficult when you were gone. I was...” he trailed off and then bowed his head, running a hand through his hair. Seeming frustrated with himself, he said, “I was a wreck.”

Rose waited a few more moments, hoping that he might add something else. He didn’t. Still, she reckoned—it was the first time he’d talked much at all about what he’d done during their separation.

“I’m back now,” she said. For good measure, she added, “And I’m not going anywhere.”

His responding smile was tight, but he nodded. Rose wasn’t sure if she’d actually got through to him, but she stood up to clear their empty plates.

“Wait, Rose—” the Doctor sprung to his feet. He raked his fingers through his hair again and then leaned in and pressed his lips to hers, a long and lingering kiss that took her breath away. Rose instinctively closed her eyes, leaning into him.

“What was that for?” she said after he pulled away.

“I love you.” He tapped her nose. “And I’ll see you later.”

Rose suddenly felt like she didn’t want to be separated from him—not even for a minute. “You could come with me.”

He hesitated, but then he pulled back and stuffed his hands in his pockets. “I’ll keep unpacking. I know how many toiletries you have, Rose Tyler.”

“Yeah,” she said, beginning to feel silly. She was just stopping by to see her parents for the afternoon—something she’d done a million times before. “Better get started then. I’ll be home before you even know it.”

****

After prying herself out of Jackie’s grip (and eating enough food to momentarily satisfy her), Rose knocked on the door to Pete’s home office. She waited for his “Come in!” before opening it.

Pete sat behind a wide, mahogany desk, lamp light illuminating a stack of papers held together with a metal clip. He tapped a pencil against the bottom of the papers, smiling faintly when he saw Rose.

“Good, Rose,” he said. “How are you?”

Rose closed the door behind her. “I’m fine. What’s going on? Mum said you needed to speak to me.”

He gestured in front of him. “Why don’t you take a seat?”

Rose hesitated and then took a seat in the armchair in front of his desk. Now that she was closer to him, she could see that his smile was strained and his eyes were worn and tired.

“So…” she said, keeping her voice light. “Have you got documents for me to sign? I reckon a person can’t just come to life overnight.”

She smiled, but Pete looked tense and on edge. “It’s a little more complicated than that, Rose.”

“What is?”

Pete sighed and then reached into his desk drawer. He pulled out a bottle of scotch and two glasses. He filled them both, handing one to her before taking a sip of his own.

“Dad?” she pressed, holding her own glass between her hands. “What’s going on? Tell me.”

He spoke slowly. “The Doctor didn’t... handle your disappearance well.”

“Yeah,” said Rose. “He told me. He thought I was dead.”

Pete watched her with sad eyes. “Did he tell you anything else?”

“How do you mean?”

“A lot can happen in two months.”

Rose took a sip of scotch, delaying her answer. She winced as it burned down her throat. “He said… he said he killed the people who took me.”

Pete nodded absently, gazing off into space. “It wasn’t just them. Rose, I’ve never see him like that. He was crazed, bordering on insane at times.” He paused and then added, “He worked for Torchwood.”

“He wouldn’t,” said Rose immediately. “You’re joking. He hates Torchwood.”

Pete smiled thinly. “I don’t think he quite knew what else to do with himself.”

“Oh,” Rose said. She peered down into her scotch glass and tried to imagine what it would be like to find the Doctor’s dead body. Wouldn’t she be the same way? Crazed and out of her mind with grief?

She shivered and took another sip of scotch. Being separated from him on the other side of the galaxy had been bad enough.

“That’s not all,” said Pete. “He was furious—I think a part of him wanted to get back at the universe for taking you away.”

Rose nodded mechanically. Her thoughts strayed to the Doctor after the Time War. He could be so cold back then, even cruel, somehow desperate for forgiveness yet resentful of it. He’d worn that battered leather coat like it was a shield, a message to the world.

“Sounds like him,” Rose finally said, smiling faintly.

“He killed eighty innocent people,” Pete said softly. Rose looked up, wide-eyed gaze falling on Pete’s face. “He thought they were invading, and he killed them. No warning, no chances, nothing.”

Rose sat in stunned silence, scotch glass frozen in her hands. Finally, she shook her head. “He wouldn’t do that.”

Pete stood up, pacing his study before his eyes fell on a framed photograph of him and the other Jackie—the one who had been killed by Cybermen. He stilled.

“I covered for him,” Pete said. “God knows what would have happened to him if it got out.”

Rose swallowed past a lump in her throat, denials dying on her lips. Deep down, she knew that Pete wouldn’t lie about something like this. She thought about how the Doctor had said goodbye that morning—with that lingering kiss and his whispered “I love you.” He’d known, Rose thought suddenly. He knew exactly why Pete wanted to talk to her.

He’d... oh—he’d... _oh_. Tears burned her eyes as she realized he thought it would be the end. It explained his shaking fingers as he slid her wedding ring back on her finger and the desperate way they’d been having sex. She’d thought it was because of their separation, but it was more than that.

It was eighty innocent people.

“It wasn’t his fault,” Rose burst out. “It’s like you said—he thought it was an invasion.”

“Rose,” Pete said heavily. “He should have waited. He didn’t.”

“I don’t care,” Rose said, suddenly _furious_ with Pete. How could he stand there so calmly and say those things about the Doctor? “I’m not gonna just… just… leave him or anything. No way.”

“I know,” Pete said firmly. “I just thought you should know. I imagine this is going to haunt him for some time.”

Rose looked away, feeling guilty for her outburst. “Sorry.”

“I wired money into your account,” Pete continued. “Take him... I don’t know where. Just take him... away.”

Rose felt a flash of anger again. “We have our own money. _Dad_.”

“Think of it as a compensation package from Torchwood, then.” He paused and in a gentler voice added, “I’m trying to do the right thing here.”

“Yeah, but this isn’t some wayward employee—it’s the _Doctor_.”

“I know that,” Pete said sharply. “Blimey, Rose... if this was anyone else...” he sighed and sat back down at his desk. “I’ve tried to do my best with him, but there’s no question it’s called my abilities to do this job into question. I should resign.”

He looked so forlorn that Rose felt her defensiveness melt away. “No, Dad—don’t talk like that. Torchwood needs you. You’re the best.”

She gave him a weak smile and he hesitated before returning it. “Thanks,” he said absently.

Rose searched around for something to say. “So a vacation,” she said brightly. “Exactly how long are we talking?”

“Six months? A year? Two years?” Pete said with a smile. “Think of it as a second honeymoon. Travel the world. Just... remember to phone your mother every week, will you?”

“Got it,” said Rose. She set down her scotch glass and then stood up, glancing towards the door hesitantly. She felt like she should say something else. She finally settled on, “The Doctor does love travelling.”

Pete didn’t smile. “Talk to him, Rose,” he said, fixing her with an urgent stare. “Help him face up to what he’s done. Guilt like that... it will eat away at him.”

“I will,” Rose said, and her voice didn’t waiver. Then, because it needed to be said, she added, “You’re going to keep this quiet, yeah? Forever?”

“I give you my word.”

“Okay. Good.” She moved to the door, and then said, “Thanks, Dad. For everything.”

Without waiting for a reply, she opened the office door and stepped through it.

****

It was dark by the time Rose returned to the flat.

“Doctor?” she called, closing the door behind her. She breathed into the stillness of the hallway and for one panicked second found herself thinking that he was gone.

Then he called, “Here!”

Rose slumped against the door in relief. Then, tossing her keys onto the side table, she followed the voice to the living room. She waited for her eyes to adjust to the darkness and could just make out his shape on the sofa.

She swallowed hard. “How come you’re sitting in the dark?”

He didn’t reply and Rose felt her way forward. She banged her leg against the coffee table, and then gingerly sat down on the opposite edge of the sofa. There, she folded her hands in her lap, turning to face him. She still couldn’t see him very well and he didn’t look in her direction.

She decided to jump right in. “Dad told me about what happened.”

There was a heavy silence and the Doctor shifted slightly, resting his elbows on his knees. “Oh?” he said.

“I don’t care,” Rose blurted. She sensed more than saw him turning to look at her. “No, that didn’t come out right. I just... I wish I had been there for you.”

“Rose,” he said, and there was a heaviness and despair in him she hadn’t seen for years—not since he regenerated. She remembered with sudden, perfect clarity what he had been like back then. She could see the way his shoulders would stiffen and he would pierce her with that steady unflinching state. That stare meant he might threaten to take her back home.

But she wasn’t nineteen and he wasn’t that man anymore.

“Tell me about what happened,” she said.

He sprung up from the sofa, blending into the shadows of their living room. “Rose, don’t,” he said, with an unspoken warning.

“Tell me,” Rose demanded. “It doesn’t matter what you did, but just... just _tell_ me.”

He moved to the window, pulling back the drapes to look out at the city below them. “There were ships all over the night sky,” he said. “They wouldn’t respond to our communications.” He paused. “I thought it was an invasion.”

He fell silent, still staring out the window. Rose’s heartbeat rung in her ears, but she pushed on. “It’s a bit rash, though, shooting them down,” she said. “It doesn’t sound like you.”

“No. I wasn’t myself.” He turned around and she could just make out the pale silhouette of his face from the lights streaming in through the window. “I was... I was furious—at you, at the universe, but mostly at myself. I should have _known_ , Rose. Nine-hundred years of alien knowledge and for _what_? They killed you and I did _nothing_. I didn’t even know.” He paused. “And then... _then_ they invaded. So I killed them.”

He fell silent. Without another word, Rose moved up behind him, wrapping her arms around his waist and pressing her face into his back. She felt him shudder and then he turned around, burying his face in her shoulder and hugging her tightly.

“You should have told me,” Rose said. “You _should have_.”

“I couldn’t,” he whispered. “I just... I couldn’t.”

She wanted to grab him by the shoulders and shake him. She was his _wife_. That’s what married people did—they told each other the important things no matter how bad or unpleasant they were.

Instead she held him and said, “We’re gonna make it through this. I promise.”

He didn’t respond right away and it frightened her. If there was one thing she knew—while trapped in another universe or on the other side of the galaxy—it was that she believed in _them_. She’d thought the Doctor felt the same way.

Finally, he said, “What if it happens again?”

She pulled away, feeling panic twist inside of her again. Swallowing it down, she went to flick on the lights, buying herself time to think. Squinting under the bright glare of the overhead lamp, she turned back to the Doctor. “How do you mean?”

He gestured vaguely at the air and then shoved his hands in his pockets, focusing on the wall behind her shoulder. “What if I lost you, Rose? For good? I don't know if you've noticed, but my coping mechanisms leave something to be desired.”

“You're not going to.”

The Doctor looked frustrated. “You can’t make that promise.”

“I know, but...” Rose searched for something to say, beginning to feel desperate. “Isn’t it worth it, Doctor? What we have?” She swallowed. “ _Isn’t it_?”

He met her gaze, silent. He hesitated for what seemed to Rose to be an eternity, and then said, “Yeah. Yeah, it is.”

Rose breathed out in relief. “Okay. Good.”

A heavy silence fell and Rose shifted awkwardly. She didn’t know what else to say. Finally, she summoned up a smile and said, “Is there anything else I should know?”

“No, I don’t think...” the Doctor glanced around, eyes falling on the abandoned cable line in the corner. “I did destroy the television set.”

Rose managed a shaky laugh. “Right. Grounds for divorce, that is.”

As soon as the words left her mouth, Rose wished she could take them back. His gaze snapped back to hers, entire body tensing.

“I didn’t mean...” she began.

“Yeah, I know,” said the Doctor. “It’s fine.”

It didn’t sound like it was fine. Rose stared at him in indecision, biting down on her lip. She wished there was some way she could make it better for him.

“I’d understand if you wanted to leave,” he said abruptly. “ _I’m_ not even sure I want to be around me anymore.”

“Don’t be stupid,” Rose said, trying to be brisk but her voice sounded thick. “I didn’t fight my way across the galaxy just to turn around and leave. I promised forever, yeah?”

The Doctor still seemed doubtful. “Yeah.”

Rose took a step closer to him and took his hand. “Listen, I’m not saying that it was right what happened—but it did, and I’m sorry that you had to go through that. Doesn’t change what I feel for you, though, yeah? Nothing could.”

He took that in quietly. “Yeah—thanks,” he said. Then, like it was a tremendous effort to do so, he continued, “I see them, Rose. Every day. Oh, not specifically _them_ —I don’t even know where they were from or what species they were. But I still see them. Eighty people crying out, all of them with families who will never see them again... who will always wonder. And I destroyed them.” He closed his eyes and shook his head, and when he spoke again it was a whisper. "Innocent people, and they weren't even..." He trailed off, letting out a shaky breath. "I've never killed like that before, not innocent people, not for _no reason_ other than my own..." With a frustrated sigh, he scrubbed as at his face with his hands. He was silent for a moment, face hidden, and then he dropped his arms to his sides and looked at her miserably. "Nine hundred years, Rose, and this -- this is the most unforgivable thing I've ever done."

Rose didn’t know what to say. For the first time, she had a sense of the immense _anguish_ the Doctor must have been carrying around with him. How had he stood it, day after day?

"I'm sorry," she said and it felt like the most useless phrase she'd ever uttered. "Doctor, I am _so sorry_."

He scrubbed his hands over his face again and then sat back down on the sofa, hunched over the coffee table. He didn't say anything--he barely moved. He just _sat_ there, body tense, staring somewhere far away.

Rose fought the urge to break down into hysterics. He _needed_ her. He'd been there for her when she needed him--now it was her turn.

Without uttering anything else (what could she say?), she sat down next to him, wrapping her arms around his shoulders. To her relief, he moved into her arms almost immediately, pressing his face against her neck. She rubbed his back in slow circles, occasionally whispering soothing platitudes. ("It's going to be okay, I promise.")

She held him for a very long time.

****

It was a few hours later that she brought up Pete's suggestion that they go travelling. She and the Doctor were sitting across from each other at the kitchen table, each of them nursing a cup of tea. Even though the dark circles under his eyes belied his exhaustion, Rose felt like she had his full attention for the first time in days.

She knew that she couldn't make things better overnight, but she felt a flare of hope. He'd talked to her--for the Doctor, that was a huge first step. If he needed a shove in the right direction, so be it.

"I've been thinking," she said abruptly, thumbing the rim of her cup, "and it looks to me like you've got two options. One, you can lock yourself away from everyone and hide from the world so you can't harm anyone else but you'll never do any good for anyone, either." She took a deep breath and lifted her eyes to meet his. "Or two, you accept that you made a terrible mistake and do everything in your power to make up for it. What do you think?"

The Doctor watched her with his mouth open but didn't make a sound.

“We can’t bring them back," she went on, "but we can do other things. Help other people. And maybe one day it won’t hurt so much. You just need...”

“Time?” the Doctor suggested bitterly.

“That’s how we humans cope," Rose said simply. She shrugged. "It's up to you."

The Doctor nodded like he accepted that and then took a sip of tea. "What do you have in mind?"

"Pete gave me some money."

The Doctor snorted. "Good old Pete. Looking out for his daughter."

Rose ignored him. "I thought I might go travel the world."

He sounded intrigued. "Travel the world?"

"Yeah," she said. She gave him a real smile and leaned forward across the table. "Might get lonely, though. I could use a companion. Are you busy?"

"Am I..." he started before sobering. "Rose Tyler, I'd love nothing more than travelling the world with you."

The way he was looking at her made her heart flutter. “No TARDIS, so we’ll be stuck going the human way. But we’ve got to start somewhere. What d’you think?”

“I think it sounds like just the thing we need. Have you got a plan?”

“Nope,” she said, taking a sip of tea. Beneath the table, she nudged his foot with hers. “I reckon this is something we’re going to have to figure out as we go along.”


End file.
